A Song of Flames
by wannabeWriter888
Summary: AU Origin story for Black Siren. How does a woman who sees the best in all people, fights for justice and hope on one Earth turn into a murderous villain on another? She's broken one piece at a time. This is how the Black Siren was made, not born.
1. Spark

**Disclaimer** : I do not own _Arrow_ or the Green Arrow comics, I am just playing with the characters because I'm not all that happy with the show's writing.

 **A/N** : I'm posting this at a M rating because I'm paranoid and this is intended to be dark. Not as dark as some of the things I've read on this sight, but lots of characters will be dying. I don't get explicit, but read at your own risk. This work was inspired by an interview Katie Cassidy gave as to some of her head cannon for Black Siren as well a work Andrus Tolero once had up on the site about Black Siren. **Forewarning - death of child in this chapter.**

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Spark

Dinah Laurel Lance never planned on being the villain. When she was a young girl, she dreamed of standing in the light and fighting for justice. She wanted to be a detective just like her father, or perhaps a lawyer. Those dreams bled away one frigid winter night on a road outside Starling City.

From one loss to another, Dinah Laurel Lance descended into darkness. She didn't wake up one morning and say, "Screw the world and let it burn." Instead she lost her humanity piece by piece, equalizing at each new depth without even realizing what she was doing, what she was losing. When she finally looked up, she only saw the darkness of the waters above and a face in the mirror young Dinah Laurel Lance wouldn't have recognized. By that point, she no longer cared.

BC-BS-BC-BS

The year Dinah Laurel Lance turned ten, she began her campaign to go camping. Laurel, as she preferred to be called back then, had heard stories about camping from several her grade school friends and the trips had sounded very fun. Her seven- soon-to-be eight-year-old sister, Sara, was easily swayed to the idea with the promise of s'mores and roaring campfires.

Convincing their parents took more effort with their mother seeking tenure and their father a very busy detective; time appeared to be the greatest obstacle. Laurel persisted in her campaign with detailed research into the educational benefits of exploring the great outdoors and liberal use of Sara's puppy eyes. Finally, just before the new school year began, their parents caved in and agreed to a weekend in the nearest campground.

They bought a tent, sleeping bags, and a couple of coolers for food. Quentin Lance also bought two fishing rods for Laurel and Sara as a surprise, intending to teach them how to fish the way his father had taught him. The promised weekend approached, the bags were packed into the family's station wagon, and then the bodies dropped, quite literally.

A triple homicide including a major drug dealer in the Glades had Quentin pulling extended tours, trying to track down the killer before a drug war began. He had just enough time to stop by the house and wish his girls a good trip before heading in to work overtime that weekend. Dinah Lance brought her daughters home the next morning; their hearts weren't in the trip without Quentin and she wasn't particularly experienced at putting up tents.

After the fiasco of her first camping trip, Laurel lost interest in the endeavor. She stopped her campaign and ignored the stories her schoolmates told, what did they know anyway? Quentin never caught his killer; he found the culprit but not the evidence needed to put the man away and instead a new, more dangerous drug cartel started taking over the Glades with ruthless efficiency.

Life went in the Lance household. Quentin managed to return to normal tours, though his workload only seemed to increase. He succeeded in taking down a few of the new drug dealers, putting pressure on their operation, and he continued his pursuit of the killer leading them. Dinah Lance earned her tenure but had to take on a night class at the request of her department head, which kept her out of the house most nights of the week. At school, camping stories faded as new rumors about the return of a masked vigilante spread like wildfire – a blonde-haired woman in black who defended the helpless and waged war on the drug cartels with the help of the police.

December reached them before Laurel knew it and Sara was a bouncing ball of anticipation, she had all sorts of birthday wishes and was impatient to know what she was getting. The last weekend before break and a little over a week before Sara's birthday, the Lance sisters arrived home on Friday to a surprise. Quentin had wrangled to get the entire weekend off and had found a small cabin for the whole family to share in a campground only a few hours away.

They had a roaring fire in the cabin's fireplace, hot chocolate, and s'mores with late night ghost stories. Quentin even took Sara and Laurel ice fishing on a nearby pond; they didn't get any bites, but then there were no fish in the pond. Dinah had to head back into the city early, she had a large stack of term papers to grade, but this trip was exactly what Laurel had dreamed. She imagined camping the next summer would be just as fun and her parents promised they would try to make that dream happen as well.

Sunday afternoon arrived much too soon, but they had only half a week left of school and Sara's birthday party and Christmas to look forward to. Laurel watched the winter-covered trees shuffle by and smiled as she remembered the snow-family they'd built near the cabin. Sara chattered away at her favorite toy bear, talking about the gifts she was hoping to receive while trying to watch her dad for a reaction. Quentin was laughing on the inside at Sara's antics as he turned up the radio so that they could all listen to some Christmas music on the drive home.

"Can I have some peanuts?" Laurel asked as the sun began to set on the horizon.

"Can you?" Quentin retorted, and Laurel huffed before correcting herself; "May I have some peanuts?"

"I want a snack too," Sara declared as Quentin handed the bag of peanuts back.

"What do you want Sar-bear?"

"I'm not sure," Sara unbuckled her seatbelt and leaned forward, the better to see into the bag of goodies on front passenger seat.

"Sara, sit back down and put your seatbelt on," Quentin instructed in his commanding voice. He glanced back at his youngest for only a second, to show her he was serious but not upset with her. Sara harrumphed and sat back down.

Everything that happened afterward, happened too quickly for Laurel to process in detail. The car shook, and metal screeched against metal. Quentin cursed and fought against the wheel. Sara and Laurel screamed. The car spun off the road, hit the curb just right, and flipped topside into the ditch.

Glass broke, then shattered. The car rolled twice before landing wheels down at the bottom of the ditch. Laurel's ears were ringing. She felt something warm trickling down her face. She couldn't catch her breath. Her fingers scrabbled with her belt buckle before she finally clicked her free. The taunt belt retracted and the pressure on her chest disappeared. Laurel inhaled deeply, her mind still reeling. She thought she might get sick and turned, trying to find the window.

She found the door handle and decided that would do. She had to push her shoulder into the door to get in open, then toppled to her knees as soon as she stepped outside. The ground was black and red and white and cold, but the cold helped clear some of the fogginess out of her brain. The black was dirt, the white snow, and red was the streaks of blood she was leaving. Everything hurt, and her mind was still sluggish, but she was alive and that was good.

Then Quentin was in front of her, grabbing ahold of her arm and gingerly touching her head near a sore spot; "Laurel sweetie, are you alright? Laurel?" He had a large cut on his cheek and the knuckle on his left hand was swelling larger each second, but his concern was for her not himself.

"'m fine, I'm fine," Laurel grabbed her dad's uninjured hand and squeezed hard; "What about Sara?" Laurel turned to look back into the car, but Sara wasn't in the backseat. Her side door wasn't opened, but she wasn't there; "Daddy, where's Sara?"

They found Sara lying nearly ten yards back from the car. She'd landed in pristine snow, but the edges around her were darkening with blood. Her left leg was twisted at an unnatural angle and she didn't seem to be breathing right. Laurel wanted to pick her little sister up and cradle her, but Quentin wouldn't let her. He had her hold Sara's hand while he went back to the car for a sleeping bag to help keep her warm and the cell phone they kept for emergencies.

"You're going to be okay Sar-bear, you hear me," Laurel whispered, squeezing her sister's hand tightly, but Sara remained unconscious. Quentin was returning with the blanket and cell phone when Laurel heard car doors slam on the road above them; "Do you hear that Sara, helps coming and so is Daddy."

Three men slide down the hillside, but they didn't come to help. Even from a distance, Laurel could see they carried guns and that they were ready to shoot. She squeaked at Quentin as he was covering Sara in the blanket and he turned to look. His hand went for his waist, where he normally wore his service weapon, but he was off the job and there was no weapon for him there. He dove for his ankle and pulled out the pistol he holstered there, but the men were upon them at that point.

"Please, leave my daughters out of this, they're just children," Quentin begged, standing between his girls and the three men with ice in their eyes. His pistol never wavered from the leader.

"We have no interest in your children Detective, lower your weapon and they won't be harmed, further," the leader said, the smallest and coldest of the men.

Quentin took one glance back at his daughters and complied. The men took Quentin's gun and pulled him back to the car. One of the men stayed next to Laurel and held her down with a hand on her shoulder. Laurel held onto Sara's hand tightly, knowing she should do something, but not sure what she could do that would help. She watched on helplessly as the other two men tied Quentin up and covered him with gasoline.

"Why are you doing this? Do you really want to start a war with SCPD?" Quentin choked out hoarsely, afraid but defiant.

"This has nothing to do with you being a cop, Detective Lance. This is a message for your wife," the leader replied mockingly. Then he lit three matches and dropped them down Quentin's shirt.

Laurel screamed and jerked away from the hand on her shoulder. She made it three steps before the man yanked her back and forced her to her knees. She scratched and kicked and bit at him, but he clocked her upside the head and left her too dizzy to do anything but watch. Her father howled and convulsed as he was burned alive.

The three men left once Quentin stopped shrieking and moving. They left Laurel to crawl back to Sara and grab her sister's hand with trembling fingers. Her breath started misting in front of her and she whispered to her baby sister to stay strong. Night fell, and Sara's breathing grew more ragged. Laurel shivered from the swiftly dropping temperatures but refused to leave her post. She could not look at the blackened mess that was left of her father, so she focused on her sister.

Sara's hand was ice in Laurel's but then both their hands were cold, so she didn't think anything of it. The blood around Sara stopped spreading, which Laurel thought might have been a good thing. Then Sara stopped breathing and Laurel didn't know what to do.

She held onto Sara's hand as tears poured down her face. Soft sobs racked her body. Sara never woke up.

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 **A/N 2** : Huh, hadn't realized it's been nearly two years since I last posted - had to join the real world as an adult which sapped away my creativity for a long time. This story is set to have ten chapters. Most have already been written - I wanted to make sure I would complete this story before I posted it, this way my muse is more cooperative. I will only be posting one chapter a week until I get the last written, after that I'll probably put the whole story up in a couple of days. Please review if you like, contain any criticism to legitimate development issues and ways I could better my writing, do not post hate just because I'm creating a backstory you'd don't like.


	2. Smolder

Disclaimer: I do not own the right to _Arrow_ or any DC comics. I would not be writing fanfiction if I did.

 **A/N** : Constructive reviews are appreciated.

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Smolder

The doctors declared it a miracle that she didn't die of hypothermia and pure luck to have no concussion from the crash or frostbite after spending six hours in the bitter cold. They said nothing about the wounds trying to kill her on the inside.

Laurel told the detectives assigned the case everything she remembered about the three men. She remembered more than most witnesses; she was a detective's daughter after all. Her testimony meant nothing without someone to charge and even with her descriptions, the police had trouble locating the men that killed her father and sister. As the months passed with no results, Laurel's trust in the justice system began to waver.

The nightmares began almost right away. Laurel would wake screaming of blonde little angels dancing in blood or blackened dragons spewing fire from their mouths. Dinah sent her daughter to a psychologist, but Laurel refused to talk. Her father had scorned head shrinks, saying they only messed people up more and Laurel had believed him.

Laurel withdrew into herself. She applied herself to her school work with only half the heart she used to. The kids at school shied away from her as if murdered family members might be contagious. Laurel told herself she didn't care, that they were are all a bunch of babies anyway.

A year passed in sullen silences and ears aching for sounds that couldn't be made anymore. The nightmares refused to stop. The trail to find the killers went cold. Dinah Lance continued to disappear at odd hours of the night and come home with bruises and cuts she couldn't explain. Laurel's grades began to slip. And then finally, on what should've been Sara's ninth birthday, Laurel screamed out the truth that had been stewing in her heart.

When the detectives had questioned her, Laurel had kept one secret back. She shared it with no one. Not the psychologist or her former friends at school and certainly not to her adoptive Uncle Ted, who'd begun checking in the Lance women more regularly following the murders. Her classmates may not have talked to her more than necessary anymore, but they still talked around her and Laurel listened very well.

She heard the expanding rumors about Starling City's Black Canary, a former vigilante from Gotham, and she heard about the brutal fights the Canary was getting in with the drug cartel that killed Laurel's family. Laurel could put two and two together and when at last she realized why her father and sister had died, she finally had a target for her rage that she could vent on.

She started with small acts of defiance that soon morphed into open disobedience. When punishments failed to curb her attitude, Dinah learned to stop asking her daughter to do anything. Laurel turned to barbed comments and hurtful digs next, drawing gleeful vengeance when her mother's eyes turned misty at her words. Uncle Ted tried to step in, to stop Laurel's constant barrage, but Laurel refused to listen. She wanted someone to pay and if it couldn't be the killers, the reason they killed would do. The fact that Dinah remained oblivious to the cause of Laurel's rage only fueled her fury further until that birthday rolled around.

Laurel spent most of Sara's birthday in silence as refusing to acknowledge her mother's presence seemed to hurt her as much as the insults did. Laurel tried her best to not think about the happier birthdays Sara had known while also trying to remember the sound of her sister's laughter. She did better at the first objective then the second; there were a lot of things she couldn't remember as clearly as she wanted to and often that made her want to cry. Whenever she felt like crying she focused on her anger instead and that resulted in a very combustible mood come the afternoon.

"I was thinking of visiting Sara before it gets dark," Dinah commented at last, already dressed in her coat. She knew better than to ask Laurel a direct question at this point. She'd learned it was safer to present an idea, then see how Laurel responded before acting. Then she either strong-armed her daughter into playing along or followed her only living child in resigned silence.

"You have no right visiting her," Laurel snapped back.

"Why not?" Dinah sighed. She waited patiently for Laurel to respond, but Laurel had retreated into ignoring Dinah's existence. Dinah sighed again, a sure sign that she was giving up, but then she squared her shoulders and marched directly into Laurel's line of sight on the couch in their living room; "If you don't want me visiting your sister, give me one good reason why. Don't just say I have no right, talk to me!"

"Because you're the reason SHE'S DEAD. YOU'RE THE REASON THEY'RE BOTH DEAD!" Laurel exploded, jumping off the couch. She pushed her mother, who was so startled that she stumbled backwards and completely lost her balance, falling to the floor. Laurel stood over her, heaving, and then dashed up the stairs to her room. She slammed the door shut and buried her head into her pillow. She hadn't meant to do that, not the pushing part, but the justifying her actions. Dinah Lance didn't deserve to have the answer handed to her; she needed to figure it out on her own.

"Dinah Laurel Lance, explain," Dinah let herself into her daughter's room and stood at the edge of Laurel's bed. Her voice was calm and resolved. Laurel counted to one hundred, waiting for her mother to get the message and leave, but she stayed. Laurel took a deep breath, trying to lasso in her churning emotions, before flipping over on her bed and glaring at her mother.

"I heard them tell Daddy that they attacked, they killed him, as a message for you," the truth burned across her traitorous tongue before Laurel could stop herself. But as soon as the words were out, she saw her mother pale and a pain far deeper than any Laurel had caused before filled Dinah's eyes. This prompted Laurel to viciously keep going:

"I thought I heard wrong at first, that they had to be lying, because why would drug dealers kill a detective as message for a nobody professor. Then I heard some boys at school talking about seeing the Black Canary in action. They said they saw her fighting six of the cartel thugs and take a punch to the face, the left side of her face, and get cut on the arm, her left arm. And I realized, you had those same exact injuries around the time they saw the vigilante. You said a mugger attacked you, but that never made sense because you still had your wedding ring and wallet afterwards. Then I knew, Daddy and Sara didn't die because the cartel was angry at him, they were angry at the Black Canary and they'd figured out you were her. You got Daddy and Sara killed and I hate you for it."

Tears streaked down Dinah Lance's face as she dropped onto the edge of Laurel's bed; "I didn't know. I didn't realize. Oh, sweetie I didn't . . . I wore the mask to protect you and the ones I love, if I had known the cartel had discovered my identity, I wouldn't have continued to target them. I never wanted to put you or Sara at risk."

"Then why do you do it? Why dress up and fight criminals? Daddy always said you never have to go outside the law to get justice, but you do all the time. What would he think of you if he knew the truth about what you are?"

"He knew Laurel, he knew I was the Black Canary, and he understood the world isn't black and white," Dinah revealed, much to Laurel's shock; "Your dad swore to uphold the law and worked in service of it, but he knew there were times you have to bend the law a little to see justice done and at the end of the day, justice is more important than the letter of the law."

"He knew, and he never arrested you?" Laurel couldn't wrap her head around that contradiction of the father she knew.

"He understood that there were places I could go, things I could do for the good of others that he couldn't. Your dad didn't like what I did, hated it really, but he saw the difference my help made in cleaning up crime in the Glades. I work to help the police get justice, not play judge, jury, and executioner and I made it clear to him that there would be lines I would never cross. It helped him live with what I did, but he promised that if I ever did cross the line, he'd arrest me, and I would've expected nothing less from him."

"But what about me? What about Sara?" the anger pulsed through Laurel again as she asked this question, but now it shared space with an ache that came from the depths of her heart.

"I was the Black Canary long before you two were born and I did think about giving it up when I first found out I was pregnant with you, but then I realized I couldn't. Not because I needed to be the Canary, but because I wanted to make the world a safer place for you and later your sister. I couldn't just stand by and watch the crime rate skyrocket around our home when I knew I had the skills to stop it," Dinah explained with each parts passion and pain. "Every criminal I help put behind bars, makes this city a better place for you to grow up in. I do what I do because of how much I love you and want to do everything in my power to protect you."

"But you failed to protect Sara, to protect Dad," Laurel felt her anger slipping away, only for her pain to engulf her as deeply as it had that terrible night the year before.

"You're right, I did. I made mistakes, mistakes that cost us your father and sister. I must live with that truth for the rest of my life and I blame myself for their deaths more deeply than you will ever know. I will never forgive myself and I don't expect you to either," tentatively, Dinah reached to brush away a tear running down Laurel's face; "I understand why you blame me now and I'm grateful that you told me, Laurel. You can hate me and yell at me all you want sweetie, just please, don't bottle it up any more, don't shut the whole world out. You need to let yourself grieve, to feel more than just anger, or you'll never move on, never be happy."

Laurel nodded once. Then she fell into Dinah's arms, sobbing.

BC-BS-BC-BS

The anger never really went away, but Laurel learned to forgive her mother anyway. Uncle Ted started teaching Laurel how to box to channel that pent-up anger constructively. In the process Laurel learned her adoptive uncle had his own secret identity and that her mom had back up with her on more dangerous missions, which brought her a sense of relief. She hadn't realized how much she'd begun to worry about losing her mom to the dangers of a vigilante life until Uncle Ted promised he had her mom's back.

Before her thirteenth birthday, Laurel talked her mom and Ted into teaching her how to fight, really fight. Dinah was against the idea, fearing Laurel wanted to become a vigilante, but Laurel convinced her otherwise. Her father's and sister's killers were still out there, Laurel needed to be prepared if they tried to get to her mother again through her. Dinah eventually relented, but she set up a training regime so hard, Laurel had no doubt her mom was trying to convince her to stop through exhaustion alone.

Laurel met her mother's challenges head on and with the stubborn determination of both her parents. She received all A's in school, exceeding her mom's requirements, and took up dancing and choir for normal extracurricular activities. She practiced the new forms and techniques she learned every minute that she had free until she could do most of them in her sleep.

She had set backs of course. Some styles were harder to master than others, but Laurel refused to give up. She wanted her life to mean something and learning to fight gave her purpose. Maybe she might turn into a vigilante someday as her mom feared or maybe she'd use her skills for some other, equally important purpose. Laurel hadn't decided yet, but she knew she wasn't going to let herself be helpless again when her family needed her the most.

Shortly after her fourteenth birthday, Laurel was sparring with Dinah after finishing her homework. They were in Ted's gym, the only ones there beside him as he'd closed for the night, but he let them use the mats as often as Laurel asked. Laurel danced around Dinah, trying to land a blow, but they'd been at this for nearly an hour and despite being younger, Laurel was tiring. She feinted a left hook, intending to strike low with her right, only for Dinah to catch her arm and use Laurel's momentum against her to flip her over her shoulder and onto the mat.

"You're still telegraphing your intentions in your lower body, you have to let the motions flow naturally, without thought or emotion if you want to surprise your opponent. Why don't we take a break and go through some boxing moves for a little while?" Dinah offered Laurel a hand up, but Laurel waved her off. Dinah shook her head and moved to the corner where they stashed their water bottles.

Laurel took a moment to catch her breath, frustration and disappointment rolling through her. She slapped her hands down on the mat, angry at her inability to improve in this area. Then she let out a little shriek, it was a childish thing to do she knew, but she was feeling a little childish in the face of her resounding defeat – she hadn't really screamed in years, not since **that** night, but this day it slipped out. She was angry that day as well and feeling guilty, for another Father's Day was about to pass without him there to celebrate. She didn't expect her shriek to pierce so sharply that the glass in the lights above her shattered, because that wasn't humanly possible.

Dinah shouted, and Laurel had just enough wherewithal to cover her face with her arms before shards of broken glass rained down on her. When the last piece clinked to the mat near her ear, Laurel lowered her nicked and bleeding arms to share an astonished look with her mother. What had she just done?


	3. Smoke

Disclaimer: I don't own _Arrow_ or the comics it was loosely, very loosely base on.

 **A/N** : Positive reviews are welcome; constructive feedback also appreciated.

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Smoke

Dinah called her gifted and Uncle Ted thought she had a special ability to be used wisely. But it was Michael who said what the other two wouldn't, that they didn't have a clue how she could scream at such a high frequency; that they had no idea what she was.

Michael Sanders was another, former vigilante friend of her mother's. After learning Ted's secret identity, Laurel wasn't so surprised to discover her mother had once led two very different lives. At first, Laurel didn't understand what use Michael would be when even he didn't know why she could shatter glass with her cry. Then she learned he was a reincarnated prince from ancient Egypt and he'd seen many inexplicable things in his numerous lifetimes.

Laurel's screams didn't always produce a glass-shattering pitch, not right away. The power and consistency of her screams grew with age and training. Over the course of two years, Laurel went from occasionally breaking lights when she was angry to collapsing a brick house intentionally. Michael played a significant role in training her to use her gift with purpose; he was the first to suspect that with focus she could learn to hit different frequencies and cause various levels of destruction. Thanks to him, Laurel learned to scream lightly enough to shatter a glass dome but not the vase within it. She also honed her cry to punch a small hole in a wall just big enough to slip her arm through and nothing more.

Michael also supplemented Laurel's martial arts training. He trained her in ancient techniques long forgotten, and how to fight dirty. He taught her how to use the more archaic weapons he and his reincarnating love favored, such as the mace and staff and even swords. Laurel preferred to use knives and daggers, thinking of them as her talons. Between Michael and Ted, Laurel heard a lot of stories about her mom in her younger vigilante days, much to Dinah's horror.

Laurel found a new sense of normal in the outskirts of the vigilante life. She had her school work and activities to keep her grounded in the regular world and even a part-time job. Her adoptive uncles provided her paternal advice without ever trying to replace her dad. Her mom tried her best to keep Laurel safe and happy, despite the losses that still haunted their home. Then tragedy struck again the summer after Laurel's sixteenth birthday.

It had been nearly six years and Quentin and Sara Lance's killers still roamed free. The police had all but given up on getting justice for one of their own, but Dinah and Laurel had not. Dinah had a board in the basement dedicated to tracking down those that killed her loved ones. She had the sketches Laurel had helped create shortly after the murders, nicknames for the three killers that she'd learned from various drug members she took down, and a decent idea of each man's personality and habits gained through arduous detective work.

The leader of the three killers was a top-ranking lieutenant in the cartel and a man known for his paranoia. He'd been keeping a low profile with his two accomplices, knowing the police and Black Canary would be out for blood. Six years was a long time to remain in the shadows however and keep a tight leash on both collaborators. They started making slip ups, whispers started getting around of where they'd been spotted, and then of where they were planning to go.

The police didn't hear the rumors, but Black Canary held her ear closer to the ground. She tracked the whispers back to their sources and corroborated the information. Then when she was certain of the date and place where all three killers would be, she carefully planned her assault with the help of a former associate.

Laurel had just finished sorting the roses needing to be trimmed when her supervisor called her to the front of the shop. She'd taken a late shift that Thursday night, wanting to save up some extra money for a special birthday gift she had planned for her mom. There's was something off in her supervisor's voice, so Laurel approached cautiously. When she saw the patrolmen standing with her supervisor, she shook her head in denial. The looks on their faces confirmed her worst nightmare. Laurel fell to her knees.

It was a trap after all. The lieutenant and the other two killers were the bait the cartel used to finally end their Black Canary problem. They didn't count on Hawkman stepping through the door first and taking the round of bullets meant for her. Black Canary struck at them from the back of the house, knocking out the active shooters one-by-one, but in the end, she was too late. Hawkman lay dying and she went to him, to help him retreat. She didn't spot the lieutenant until it was too late. All it took was one shot, one lucky shot, and Laurel Lance became an orphan.

Honoring Dinah's wishes, Michael managed to remove her mask and take her weapons before fleeing the scene. He returned to Ted's gym and confessed the night's events before expiring. Without her signature wig and bo staff, the cops found Dinah Lance at the scene, not Black Canary. And the world assumed a single mother died while trying to get justice for her family. The killers involved went to jail for their crimes, at last granting justice for Quentin and Sara, and the legend of the Canary lived on.

None of this brought any comfort to Dinah Laurel Lance as she watched her mother's casket be lowered into the ground between her father and sister. This time the price of justice has been too steep. Taking not only the last of her biological family from her, but an adoptive uncle as well. She wanted to pound on her family's killers, to scream until their eyes bled; she wanted to cry until she drowned, to have just one more minute to say goodbye.

"I never got to tell her," she sobbed into Ted's shoulder later, in the room he'd rushed to set up for her in his house; "I never told her I didn't hate her, that I stopped blaming her for their deaths. I didn't even tell her I loved her the last time we spoke and now I'll never get the chance!"

"She knew Laurel, she knew," Ted whispers into her hair, but his words meant nothing without Dinah there.


	4. Ember

Disclaimer: I do not own _Arrow_ , or else there would be less of NTA and Black Siren's redemption arc would be drawn out two seasons because I like her as a villain more. I also don't own the Green Arrow comics.

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Ember

After her mother's demise, Laurel stopped using her middle name. Her mother had been a strong and courageous woman, she'd had her flaws and wasn't always the best mother she could be, but she'd loved her daughter fiercely and taught her daughter to never give up hope. Dinah honored her mother the best way she knew how, by switching to her first name and continuing her training so that one day the Black Canary would protect the streets of Starling City again. She promised Ted that she would at least wait until she turned eighteen before putting on a mask.

Dinah never planned on meeting Oliver Queen. As a Starling City resident, she of course knew about the city's golden boy. The only child of one of the city's richest families who used his money and influence for bettering the city one public library, food drive, homeless shelter, and outreach program at a time. There were days she found it difficult to believe he was the same age as her. He'd already accomplished so much, because he knew exactly what he wanted to do with his life – he set his goals and worked tirelessly to see them to fruition.

She admired him for his self-awareness and dedication, even if she felt he wasn't doing enough. What good was a free clinic when hundreds of families lived in rodent-infested apartment buildings, where the halls were flush with drugs and dirty water? Queen treated the symptoms, which was all fine and dandy, but he would have done more good if he focused his energy on the cancers eating away at their city.

At school Dinah had to listen to the jocks mocking Queen rather than admitting to feeling inadequate in the face of his accomplishments. Most of the other girls mooned over him, believing he could be their knight in white, or rather green, armor. Dinah kept her opinions to herself, though she did occasionally admit to seeing the physical appeal – Oliver Queen certainly was easy on the eyes.

When Oliver Queen strolled into her physics class the spring semester of junior year, she thought her eyes were playing tricks on her; Ted had landed in a good wallop to her head the evening before. There was no way the golden boy was attending Starling City's underfunded public high school, not unless his parents had suddenly disowned him. She watched in disbelief as the rest of the class piped down, realizing who was in their midst. Mr. McKay checked Queen's schedule and the note accompanying him, while Queen looked around the room a cheeky grin on his handsome face.

"Ahhh, righty then, looks like this is in order," Mr. McKay coughed awkwardly; "If you'd like to take seat next to uh, Miss Lance, yes Miss Lance will do nicely. She'll be able to bring you up to speed on what we're covering in no time."

Dinah did her best to not blanch at that request. She'd maintained her grades even after her mom's death, knowing the senior Dinah would've been disappointed if she'd neglected her school work to become a vigilante. Sometimes that meant teachers requested her help tutoring other students, which Dinah took in stride, but that never involved forcing her into the limelight of high school gossip. Dinah existed on a fringe in the high school cliques, a book-smart girl with a tragic life story. Her classmates associated with her, but none tried to be her friends, leaving her a mystery they had little interest is solving, which suited her just fine.

She didn't want the limelight that being seeing with Queen would bring, if only for a week or more. She didn't suspect then that he'd be sticking around a lot longer than a week.

"Hi, I'm Oliver Queen," he said after following Mr. McKay's vague pointing and the other students stares to the empty seat next to Dinah.

"I know who you are," she snarked back. She preferred to interact with her schoolmates in a prickly manner, the better to nip any ideas of friendship in the bud. She was capable of being nice and polite, but wouldn't risk a change in character, not even for golden boy Queen.

"I figured as much, but its only polite to share mine when I'm asking for yours," Oliver replied with a charming smile. It wasn't fair how sweet and genuine he looked when he smiled like that.

"Dinah Lance," she replied with a grumpy frown and shook his proffered hand. Oliver continued to smile at her as he sat down, and Dinah just knew he spelled trouble for her.

BC-BS-BC-BS

Oliver Queen was as golden in person as he appeared in the papers and on television; no, he was even more of a golden boy in person, which Dinah hadn't thought possible until she met him. Within thirty minutes of meeting him, she learned he wasn't just attending Starling High for the thrill of it but had truly transferred from his prestigious private school to graduate from her high school. He wanted to learn firsthand the effort it took for children of lesser privilege to overcome their circumstances and succeed in the world and he knew part of that lay in the education they were offered. He'd relocated to better understand what he could do to help children in the future.

He surprised her in that first meeting with his passion, and his persistence in ignoring her porcupine behavior. She knew then that Oliver Queen was destined for something great, but she never imagined that he'd want to make her a part of that future.

Oliver's transition into public school life wasn't as smooth as he dreamed it would be. All the jocks who'd mocked him before, now wanted to be his best friend. All the girls that mooned over his pictures, now mooned over him in person and tried to seduce him. Most of the kids from the Glades hated him because they believed he only saw them as charity cases. Oliver endured a lot of tormenting, even from those who claimed to be his friends, and somehow that led to him seeking out Dinah's company.

"What are you doing?" Dinah snapped at him the third lunch in a row he chose to sit at her table; "Don't you have friends elsewhere who are just dying to schmooze up to you? Because I'm certainly not going to."

"I know. You don't want me here, but at least you're honest about it and not cruel. So, would it be alright if I just sat here?"

"Fine. But don't expect me to talk to you," Dinah gave in because he looked so tired. She wondered if he had anyone supporting him in this endeavor. He certainly had no real friends at Starling High, she wasn't sure about friends at his old school, and he'd implied his parents weren't keen on this plan of his. If she didn't have Ted to support and train her in her dream of picking up her mother's mantle, she wasn't sure she'd have to stamina to reach her goal.

Eventually, they started talking. Then they became friends. After years of keeping everyone out, Dinah wasn't prepared to let Oliver in. She hadn't just built a wall and tossed away the key, she'd buried herself under a mountain, but he still found her. He was so pure and good-hearted, he slipped through all her defenses as if they weren't even there. He was sweet and compassionate; he didn't see anyone as a charity case, but people in need of tools they couldn't get to better their lives. He provided those tools and sought to transform one life at a time and so create a better world.

His passion and fire drew her to him, but it was his forgiving and loving nature that captured her. At times it scared her, how important Oliver became to her in such a brief time. She wanted his dreams to succeed, wanted to help him achieve those dreams any way she could. She found herself listening to him talk about his day, his thoughts, and feelings for hours after school and shared her own – though she never told him about Black Canary and the mask she planned to wear one day. He was like a drug to her, sweeter than air and consuming her thoughts even when he wasn't around.

She didn't mean to fall for him. She certainly didn't expect him to do the same for her. Yet there they were, seventeen and deeply in love. And for the first time in years, Dinah was blissfully happy.


	5. Burning

Disclaimer: I wish I may, I wish I might own _Arrow_ for the night - - - Darn it, still don't own the show or the comics it is very, very loosely based on.

 **A/N:** Sorry for the delay, I sometimes get slight anxiety about posting my stories. I want construct feedback, because that's the only way I'll become a better writer, but I fear criticism. Good news is, I've finished the final part. Now all I have to do is edit, re-edit, and post. Should have the entire story up soon for anyone still reading. Thanks!

* * *

Burning

Oliver knew Dinah had emotional scars. He loved her anyway. He didn't try to fix her or remold her into some gentrified lady worthy of his love. Instead he supported her as she tried to work through her issues because she wanted to be better. Their relationship wasn't all sunshine and sweet-smelling roses; they had their thorns. But the love they shared helped them overcome the petty jealousies and insecurities on both sides. They were friends, partners, and lovers.

They had both had to grow up quickly. Dinah may have lost her family, but Oliver had also ached despite his rich background. His best friend had lost both his parents at an early age and Oliver had tried to be there for Tommy Merlyn, only for Tommy to push him away and finally run away. That had pushed Oliver into trying to help others, the way he hadn't been able to help Tommy. In doing so, he also honored Tommy's parents who were great philanthropists. Oliver's divorced parents had been less than supportive views on his profession in humanities. Moira Queen accepted Oliver's choices, but wished he would give some attention to the company his father had built rather than risk squandering his wealth for the good of others. Robert Queen thought his son was weak and handing out crutches to those who were too lazy to make something of themselves.

Dinah learned to tolerate Robert Queen and his criticizing presence in Oliver's life. She had her reservations about Moira, as Moira had her own about Dinah, but eventually the two women found common ground. When Dinah expressed an interest in studying entrepreneurship, in the hopes of starting her own business someday, that cemented Moira's approval of her and it wasn't even a lie on Dinah's part. Ted liked Oliver from the start, especially since Oliver distracted Dinah from her plan of hitting the streets in a mask after her eighteenth birthday.

They decided to go to the same college, to stay together. They picked a college close to Starling City, to continue volunteering at the various charities and non-profit organizations Oliver promoted and had introduced her too. Dinah found college to be liberating. Her tragic past was no longer known by everyone around her, so she at last could just be herself. She even made a friend in her roommate, Joanna de la Vega, who was pre-law. All that really mattered her was that she had Oliver and Ted and even Moira; they were her family and they helped her to feel whole again. Their little family had room to grow though, and that's exactly what it did.

Roy Harper was a scrawny whip of a twelve-year-old with a chip on his shoulder and a busted lip when Dinah first met him. Oliver had met Roy through a mentorship program in the Glades in their senior year of high school. The boys had had a rough start, but eventually bonded – the Queen charm won Roy over, the same way it had Dinah. Then Roy's mother died, overdosed, and he was left an orphan.

"I hate the idea of him going into foster care, being tossed from one home to another. He's already been through enough and now this!" Oliver waved his hands wide as he sprawled on Dinah's bed. His head lay in her lap as she ran her fingers soothingly through his dark blonde mane. They were alone in Dinah's dorm room, Joanna at class, and she'd been listening to him dissect Roy's dilemma, trying to help him find a solution; "If only he had a Ted in his corner, who could take him in – I'm sorry, I didn't mean –"

"Shhh, I understand," Dinah pressed a finger to his lips to stop his apology. Roy's situation had brought up some unpleasant memories, but none that would upset her at Oliver's choice of words. In fact, she'd been thinking along the same line already. Oliver still looked as if he wanted to apologize to her, so she quickly bent down and kissed him.

When they finally came up for air, she finished her thought: "You're wrong you know. Roy does have a Ted in his corner, he has you."

Oliver petitioned the courts to become Roy's legal guardian and with the help of a very expensive lawyer, he won. At first, he considered dropping out of college, to force fewer changes on Roy, like a new school and new town. Roy, however, was ready for a change and so Oliver bought an apartment off campus and both continued their educations. Dinah found herself spending a lot of nights in that new apartment with her boys. She saw a lot of herself in Roy, the anger especially. She introduced him to boxing to help channel his anger the same way her mom had with her and that helped Roy warm up to her.

Defining their roles in their new little family took time. Oliver had originally been a big brother to Roy, but now had to step up and be the parental authority. They had several fights, which Dinah had to help mediate, until Roy finally learned to accept Oliver's right to make the bigger decisions in his life. Oliver did try to include Roy in the process of making those decisions and often turned to Dinah for help, which was a strange turn of events. Dinah was even less sure of her role regarding Roy as she was only Oliver's girlfriend, but once Roy accepted Oliver as a pseudo-father figure, he also accepted Dinah as a mother-figure.

In all the hustle and whirlwind changes, Oliver decided to propose. Dinah said yes without any hesitation or doubts. Maybe it wasn't the best time and maybe they were too young as Moira and Ted fretted, but it was the right thing for them. Roy was happy for them, pointing out it just made their family more official, if still odd. Ted and Moira made peace with their engagement easily enough, unable to deny how in love they were. Robert didn't even bother showing up to the wedding.

Ted walked Dinah down the aisle, and despite how overjoyed she was to be marrying Oliver, that caused an old ache to rear up. It should've been her father having that honor, just as it should've been her mother, not Moira, who helped her pick out her white dress. The tears that formed in Dinah's eyes were mostly happy, but a little bittersweet. When she looked into Oliver's eyes, she saw he knew what her tears were about, that he shared her pain, and they clung to the joy of their moment. They had a big, lavish wedding because Moira insisted, and people had expectations about such ceremonies when the Queens were involved. Dinah said her vows in front of two hundred plus people that she didn't even know, but that didn't matter because in the ceremony, all she was aware of was Oliver. His cheeky smile, the confidence in his blue eyes, and the love that radiated so purely from him.

They were all surprised when Tommy Merlyn sauntered up at the end of the ceremony to congratulate them. Oliver overcame his shock first, to pull his childhood friend into a bear hug. Tommy smiled too, yet when he shook Dinah's hand and looked her in the eye, she saw a coldness in him that seemed wrong. She ignored her instincts though, because he was an old friend of Oliver's who'd been returned to him and made their wedding day extra special.

Later the next year they held another celebration, but with fewer guests. They signed the adoption papers that day, just two weeks before Christmas, and were officially a family. After years of hating the winter for what it took from her, Dinah finally found something wonderful about the season to celebrate again. She'd set aside her burning need to take up her mother's mantle and instead focused on making a life both of her parents would've been proud to witness.

They sailed contently through the next couple of years. Roy was an energetic youth who required several extracurricular activities to keep him busy. Between college classes and games and making time to spend with each other as a couple and a family, Oliver and Dinah kept busy as well. Oliver had to let go a few his volunteer positions to keep his family first, which upset him some as there seemed to be a growing epidemic of crime and hardship in Starling, especially in the Glades. Dinah finally settled on what kind of business she wanted to run, a flower shop, and started making her dream a reality. They also made time to get to know the new Tommy Merlyn, who chummed with Robert Queen more easily than he did Oliver.

For her twenty-second birthday, Dinah gave presents to her family instead of receiving them. Oliver didn't get one, but then he already knew. He stood behind her, trying so hard not grin while their family members opened their gifts, and Dinah couldn't resist linking their hands over her abdomen.

"You got me a shirt?" Roy asked skeptically. Then he turned the red tee over and read the front: I'm a BIG brother. He snorted and rolled his eyes, but pulled the shirt over his head as he tried to hide his pleased grin.

"Oh Dinah, Oliver, how wonderful!" Moira jumped up to hug them, still clutching the white baby shoes she'd received. Ted followed suit, but after he was done clapping Oliver on the back, he asked: "Are you sure about this?"

He gestured to his new coffee mug that said: World's Best Grandpa. "Without a doubt," Oliver answered for both of them.

BC-BS-BC-BS

With a baby on the way, Oliver decided it was finally time to bury the hatchet with Robert and start fresh. He wanted both of his children to know their grandfather, the way they would never be able to know Quentin Lance. Robert seemed to want to better their relationship as well and invited Oliver to join him on a business trip to China, to get a little understanding of the family business and its importance to Robert.

They set sail on the _Queen's Gambit_. Dinah and Roy saw Oliver off at the docks, giving him a picture of the two of them. Oliver hugged Roy and made the teenager promise to stay out of trouble until he returned. Dinah kissed her husband goodbye and they joked about naming the baby after a mermaid. That was the last time she saw him, she told him she loved him, but she hadn't told him near enough or about how happy he'd made her.

There were so many things left unsaid when a week later, the _Gambit_ sank and was never heard from again.


	6. Flickers

Disclaimer: See previous chapters.

 **A/N:** When I planned this story, it was always in two parts - a tragedy and then the calm before the next storm. So, here's the companion chapter to the previous one. Constructive reviews are appreciated.

* * *

Flickers

After the _Queen's_ _Gambit_ sank, Dinah felt numb inside-and-out for weeks. Search parties were sent out, false hope swelled in her chest, only to be dashed against the shores of despair. She wanted to spend her days in their bed, her face pressed into Oliver's pillow, breathing in the scent of him one last time. She couldn't lock herself away from the world however; Roy needed her to be strong and so did the baby growing inside of her.

Dinah gave birth to a beautiful baby boy a little over five months after the Gambit sank. She named him Connor Jonas Queen. She'd thought about naming him after his father, but it still hurt so much to hear his name at that point. Besides, they'd agreed to never name their children after themselves, because as much as she'd loved her mother, there was a reason her father started calling her Laurel as a little girl. She named him Connor at Roy's suggestion and Jonas as that way he could still carry a part of his father with him.

Connor had his father's eyes and a shock of red hair that Dinah vaguely remembered seeing in pictures of her maternal grandfather. When she held him in her arms that first time, as much as it broke her heart, she knew she had to find a way to grieve and move on without Oliver. She took it one step at a time, her sons reminding her each day of all the reasons she had to live and be happy again. There were days though when she wondered how much more she could take, how many more loved ones she could lose before she could no longer pick herself back up and carry on.

Dinah finished college after delaying a semester to have Connor. Then she packed up her boys and moved back to Starling City, because she wanted them to be close to the only grandparents they had. Ted was great, the perfect grandfather and built-in babysitter she knew he would be. Moira grew distant shortly after Oliver's death, spending more time with Tommy Merlyn than she did with her grandsons. Dinah understood everyone grieved in their own way; she made certain to include Moira as much as possible in the boys' life, a gesture Moira seemed to appreciate even if she didn't always show up.

Her children became her life. There were so many firsts to be had with Connor. His first crawl, his first laugh, his first shaky steps, but her favorite was the day he called her "Mama" – though it cut her again, that he didn't learn "Dada" until he was almost two. There were plenty of firsts with Roy as well. There was his first girlfriend who lasted a week, teaching him to drive a stick shift, and his graduation where Oliver's absence was sorely felt. Dinah had a couple of her own firsts as well when she finally opened her flower shop and managed to keep it afloat without any help from Moira or Ted.

It was shortly after Roy's graduation that she decided enough was enough. For too long she'd watched Starling City turn in on itself. People stopped caring about others, helping without expecting anything in return, and without Oliver there to show her the way to bring the good out of people with her words and her actions, she found another path. Her city was under attack from drugs and violence and corruption, the police weren't doing enough, and neither was the DA's office. That left only one avenue for change that Dinah knew of and at last she donned her mother's mantle. She chose a new name for herself, though she wore a similar outfit to the Black Canary. She called herself Black Siren on account of her scream, which she occasionally used to disorient larger opponents or to dislodge her targets from the homes they holed up in. Ted was a protective voice in her ear every night she went out, a cautious one that she knew to listen to because she couldn't risk leaving her boys alone in this world. Afterward he was a sound adviser; helping her learn from her errors and grow more successful in her take-downs until he declared her better skilled in strategy and investigation than him.

Juggling her kids, her shop, and her nightlife proved more difficult than expected at first. Eventually Ted wore her down and convinced her to take breaks from being Black Siren, to remember to live so that she knew what she was fighting for out on the streets. She even tried dating a little, around the time Connor turned three. She never went past the first date as most men had no interest in a woman with two children, especially when one was a fully grown young man who watched their every move suspiciously. She even went out with Ted's namesake nephew once, just to mess with her adoptive uncle's head. The first and only time Tommy Merlyn asked her to coffee, Dinah turned him down flat – there was something still wrong in his eyes, a darkness she almost understood and didn't like.

In her second year on the streets, Dinah realized there was more going on than people just turning on each other in the Glades. There was a machination happening beneath the surface that she thought might reveal a much larger crime afoot. She started digging deeper, knowing if she could find just one thread she might be able to unravel the entire design. She knew she was on the right trail after meeting the dark archer.

"What a waste," he commented from behind his black mask as he stepped out of the shadows. Dinah supposed he'd meant to startle her as she climbed back onto the rooftop after cleaning up another would-be mugger. To bad for him, she'd been aware of his presence the entire time.

"You could've helped," she replied, eyeing him coolly. He held himself in a trained stance, one meant to look at ease but left him ready to attack at any moment. She refused to take a defense position around him and instead shifted to watch him out to the corner of her eye. Let him think she didn't consider him a threat.

"Like I said, a waste. There is nothing worth saving in the Glades, why do you even bother?"

"No one in the Glades is beyond help. There are still parents who want a better life for their children. Sisters and brothers who deserve justice, children who haven't yet lost hope. I fight for them, you should too."

"If you still believe that, then you have not lost enough to see the truth."

"If you don't want to help, why approach me?" Dinah gave up on trying to change his mind; he'd clearly made it up a long time ago. Now she just wanted him gone and to make it clear to him to keep out of her way.

"I wanted to see if you could be persuaded to join my cause."

"And if I don't?" she turned to face him again, having seen him tensing. His response was to attack. His technique was good, but Dinah recognized his forms quickly enough. She'd never fought a member of the League of Assassins before, but her mother had and she had taught her daughter how to recognize the ways they fought in and out of uniform. More importantly, her mother and Uncle Michael had taught her how to best such an assassin.

When the dark archer realized she was gaining the upper hand, he disengaged. He pulled back to use his bow, thinking he at least had the advantage there. Clearly, he hadn't believed the rumors about her Siren Song. He found out the truth when she shattered his arrow the heartbeat after he released it and then followed that scream with a second which sent him flying off his feet. She watched him get back up, take one look at her while still on his knees, and then, he fled.

The archer never confronted her again. She spotted and sensed him watching her on other occasions, yet even when he might have stood a chance at putting an arrow through her while she was busy fighting another, he didn't take the shot. He did however counter every attempt she made to unravel the truth about what was happening in the Glades. After the third potential source of information turned up dead with an arrow in the heart, Dinah knew she'd have to find a different way to get the answers she needed. She was distracted from her investigation when Roy found out about her nightlife.

Roy was a smart kid, so she wasn't all that surprised he figured it out, but she tried hard to keep the truth from him for his own good. She probably shouldn't have used him as a babysitter as often as she did when she went out. She also should've used boxing a little less as her excuses for the injuries she occasionally couldn't hide. Of course, the night he realized the truth, he walked in on Ted prying a bullet out of her arm while still in her suit, so there really was no denying it at that point.

"You're her, I knew it!" Roy whispered loudly, knowing Connor was sleeping in the next room. Dinah and Ted looked guiltily from each other to him.

"Roy, I can explain –" she meant to lie through her teeth.

"Don't, I want in. I want to fight alongside you."

In that moment, Dinah understood her mother completely. She didn't want this life for Roy, but she couldn't deny him. He was her lost boy; she knew the fire and anger that coursed through his veins, driving him to do everything in his power to protect others, because those things lived inside her as well. She knew if she told him no, he'd only try on his own, because that's the kind of person he was, the type she'd helped raise him to be.

It was the hardest decision of her life, to agree to train him, knowing she'd be putting her son in danger. Yet she did it and found herself using the same training regime her mom had used on her all those years ago with the same requirements regarding his grades at college and life outside the training. He joined her in the field after four months, he wanted to call himself the Red Hood, but Dinah had had to tell him the name was already taken. Ted had told her about many of the other vigilantes he and her mom had known when she was selecting her own name. But that was long ago and most of those vigilantes retired, now there was just her and Ted and Roy left to protect Starling City. Brash and young, Roy was always wanting to rush into things, to do more and save as many people as he could. She called him Speedy and stuck him in a bright yellow hoodie to teach him caution – he hated it, but she told him he had to earn a real name and costume.

At least she didn't have to worry about Connor wanting to join her in the field. Her four-year-old son lived a rambunctious life, running around at daycare and charming all the other little girls. He gave her bouquets of dandelions and clovers he picked, named all his stuffed animals and made her promise not to tell them which were his favorites, and he loved to introduce himself to strangers and wish them a good day, despite her telling him to be careful. She saw so much of Oliver in Connor, it soothed and hurt her at the same time. She hoped Oliver, wherever his spirit rested, was at peace and not displeased with the way she was raising their boys.


	7. Fire

Disclaimer: If I owned _Arrow_ we would've gotten a Black Siren that was real, flawed and more than one-dimension, like we were promised. Maybe things will turn around in the next few episodes, if not, here's to hoping Season 7 does a complete reboot of the show. Also, I don't own DC comics.

* * *

Fire

Only months before Connor's fifth birthday, Robert Queen turned up alive. They found him on an island called Lian Yu. After five years of wondering, grieving, and occasionally daring to believe otherwise, Dinah at last knew how her husband died. He never made it off the _Gambit_ and to the best of Robert's knowledge, he didn't suffer. Dinah found little comfort in that.

In public the Queen family acted overjoyed to have had one miraculous return. In private, they mourned the loss of the member they'd truly wanted back. Dinah brought Connor over to the Queen mansion to get to know his grandfather, but Roy refused to come, and she didn't press the issue. If given a choice, she would've kept Connor as far away from the man as possible. Robert had always seemed cold to Dinah, now he was ice.

In the weeks following Robert's recovery, Moira visited the loft where Dinah and her boys lived more often. She claimed she wanted to give her husband space, to readjust to living back at home again. Dinah suspected she was afraid, but Moira denied it when pressed, and Dinah knew she couldn't act on Moira's behalf without some proof. She wasn't all that upset though as Connor and Roy dearly loved Moira and enjoyed having her spend so much time with them.

Then the Hood struck. A bow-wielding vigilante who killed the rich that preyed upon the poor. There was no justice in his actions, only brutal vengeance and rage. Dinah set out as the Black Siren to take him down as quickly as she could, side-lining Speedy despite his vehement objections. The Hood was a murderer, a psychopath, and she wasn't going to put her son in that kind of danger. Ted managed to talk some sense into Roy when Dinah couldn't; he still grumbled but he listened. She almost expected to see the dark archer again, joining the Hood on his inquisition.

Moira grew more terrified each passing day after the Hood appeared. She wouldn't say why and kept apologizing for every little thing, but Dinah heard a larger apology behind the little ones. This time, she didn't press Moira for answers. She went looking for them on her own. She started out too late. Moira died within a month of the Hood's arrival, three green arrows in her chest. Moira had been a second mother to her; despite the distance she'd created in the last few years, Dinah still loved her mother-in-law, and losing her cut as deeply as losing her mother had. Dinah vowed to not stop until she had the Hood behind bars.

"What do you want?" she snapped at the dark archer when he approached her one night. She was watching over Speedy as he took down a drug addict that had just robbed a liquor store, tying the man up for the police to find. It had been three months since Moira's death and she was still no closer to catching the Hood, having no idea who he was targeting or where he was operating from at night. He seemed aware enough of her to dodge her during patrol, which also frustrated her to no end.

"The other archer, he's a thorn to both of us. Only he will not risk a confrontation with me, he knows he will lose. But you, he's only wary of, you might be able to get close enough to take him out if you can surprise him."

"Tell me something I don't know."

"I know the names of his other targets."

"If you know that, why don't you surprise him yourself."

"He would see me coming if I tried, as I've tried, but you use tactics he's unfamiliar with, a new variable he didn't count on. I'm offering you a chance to stop a killer Black Siren, take it."

She accepted the list because she had no other leads. The intel ended up being good and offered her more insight into the conspiracy in the Glades. That the dark archer had been willing to kill to protect this kind of information before told her more about the threat level the Hood posed to the other archer's plans. It also revealed how desperate he was to stop the new vigilante. The more rational part of Dinah wondered if maybe the Hood was the lesser of two evils; the daughter mourning the loss of another mother didn't care.

With Ted's help, Dinah built up a profile of how the Hood operated, using a timeline of names crossed off from the list and how the killing vigilante took each name down. Moira Queen's name was noticeably absent from the list, meaning her death was personal to the Hood somehow. Dinah wasn't sure she liked what that implied but continued in her pursuit of justice. She and Ted narrowed the list of possible targets down to three. Based on the ever-decreasing downtime between his attacks, they determined the night the Hood was most likely to strike. Then they suited up and staked out all three targets – Black Siren, Wildcat, and Speedy; a new team of heroes in the shadows.

Perhaps it was fate, though more likely just luck, but Dinah's target ended up being the Hood's choice that night. She watched him tear his way through Justin Claybourne's guards, too far away to stop him. It galled her to wait, knowing that her inaction no doubt cost Mr. Claybourne his life, but to confront the Hood in the middle of his takedown would only put her at risk of being injured by both sides. So, she let him finish his attack and then flee, police sirens still too far off to catch him. She followed him until they were a safe distance away, then closed in on her quarry. She screamed, not at full power, but enough to knock him off his feet before he could aim his bow at her. Then she pounced on him, intending to leave him bruised and bloodied prior to delivering him to the police – she wanted her pound of flesh for what he'd taken from her. He fought back. He lacked any real technique, just a mashed together set of punches and kicks that a dirty fighter might pick up to survive. He relied too much on brute strength, too used to killing from a distance and using intimidation to get the job done. Dinah sent him sprawling onto his back quickly enough. His hood dropped backwards, and her shock stalled her.

"Robert?"

Robert already knew her identity, he apologized as he scrambled to his feet. He told her he could explain everything if she just gave him the chance, told her he was trying to stop a horror that would kill thousands if she didn't let him live. Dinah hesitated. Then her rational mind won over her heart and she listened.

She didn't want to believe him at first. Oh, she could believe in a group of rich business partners trying better the Glades through intimidation and blackmail of the criminal elite. She could easily accept that Thomas Merlyn was the mastermind behind the scheme; she knew about the murders of his parents in the Glades after all. The fact he'd decided their efforts weren't working fast enough, and that a more aggressive approach needed to be taken, made sense in a twisted way. And the fact that he'd named his plan to level the Glades the Undertaking certainly had the dramatic flair of a mad man who believe he was sane. What she couldn't wrap her head around was Moira willingly working with Merlyn to destroy part of the city her son had loved. Unfortunately, she couldn't deny the proof – Moira's distance, her close association with Merlyn, and most heart-breaking of all, a recording Robert had of her, admitting to her crimes.

"I came back to Starling City to right my wrongs Dinah, to do something my son could be proud of. I came back to stop Merlyn and his Undertaking, but nothing I've done has worked. The only way to save the Glades, is to kill him, and to do that I need your help."

"I'm not a murderer Robert; I may work outside the law, but I'm not judge, jury, and executioner."

"He killed Oliver."

"No," Dinah shook her head. She'd already heard too much, was still reeling from Moira's betrayal. She didn't want to hear any more painful news, but Robert pressed harder.

"Merlyn suspected I was trying to stop him. He placed a bomb in the _Queen's Gambit_ , he brought the yacht down, not some storm. He killed your husband, took him from you forever."

"Stop, just stop. I will stop Merlyn and his Undertaking, but not by killing. Enough people have died already," then she fled the roof top.

BC-BS-BC-BS

Robert had told her that Merlyn planned to use a new device that could create seismic waves to destroy the Glades, a weapon still in the building stage. He also warned Dinah that Merlyn might move up his timetable with the Hood trying to stop the Undertaking. He was right about that too in the end.

With his preferred weapon off the table, Merlyn chose the next best alternative. He planted bombs throughout the Glades and set them to denote at the same time. Merlyn moved efficiently, and off the radar of the governmental agencies meant to stop his kind of threat. Dinah only stumbled across his new plans with the help of Robert's sidekicks. She was out patrolling as Black Siren, while also scouting potential targets for the earthquake device, when she spotted a dark man with a gun conducting a sweep of the old subway entrance in the district. She got the drop on him and learned several interesting tidbits. His name was John Diggle and he worked with Robert in his Hood persona along with a techie girl named Felicity Smoak. Felicity and John were trying to secure the Glades against Merlyn's next strategy and they were focusing on the subway system since that was where he'd originally planned to plant his device. Dinah could understand Robert protecting his partners, but the fact he had neglected to mention the importance of the subway system rankled. Still, Dinah worked with Diggle and they found the first bomb.

John managed to disarm the device. After providing the component details to Felicity over comms, they realized that it was only the first of many as she found residuals of the ingredients all over the Glades. The blinking timer from the first bomb warned them that they had less than a day to try and stop Tommy. John agreed to coordinate with Black Siren and her team, then he headed back to Felicity to bring Robert up to speed on the new developments. Diggle had left, intending to convince Robert to go public with the bombs, but Dinah wasn't surprised when no press conferences were held that day. Robert wanted to stop Merlyn in the shadows; he would not embrace the light of day and risk his good name over the Glades. He wanted to end the Undertaking only to appease his own guilt, not because he cared about the people in the Glades. John Diggle cared about the people, but he couldn't change a man as stubborn and set in his ways as Robert. She understood that about Robert's nature now, but she let John discover that for himself while she made her own plans.

She and Ted tracked down as many of the bombs that they could and called in the locations to the police. At the last one, the Black Siren waited until a detective arrived, first on the scene. His name was Lucas Hilton and he had enough sense to listen when she explained the danger and need for an evacuation. She didn't give him all the gory details of course, there wasn't time for that, but she told him the basics of the conspiracy and that she'd be going after the mastermind in the hopes of stopping the bombs from going off. He demanded to know the mastermind's name, to get justice within the law, but she told him the truth; "It's too late for that."

John contacted her later that evening after the quiet evacuation had begun. Robert hadn't listened to him on any points and as soon as Felicity managed to locate Merlyn's position, the Hood had gone hunting. Dinah was torn between her desire to help get as many people out of the Glades as possible and the need to be there to stop Robert from killing Tommy, or the other way around. Roy made the decision for her. He suited up and Ted did as well, both to help in evacuation while she saw to the man who'd taken Oliver from them. She pulled Roy into a tight hug before she left, so proud of the man he'd become, and whispered how proud Oliver would be of him. "Of both of us," Roy replied.

John had given her Merlyn and the Hood's position. He was also focused on the evacuation; he had family in the Glades as well as friends. Dinah found Robert and Tommy amidst a death fight. They were evenly matched in build and strength, though Robert's patchwork style threw Tommy off his game after years of unskilled and formally-trained opponents. Yet Tommy had youth and stamina on his side and all the time he needed to wait Robert out. Merlyn spotted Dinah before she found an opening to scream – in the field she didn't like to hit her allies with her ability. Toommy knew he was out-numbered and out-classed. He swung at the Hood with a new ferocity and speed, quickly over powering Robert and forcing the older man to his knees. He placed a sword to Robert's neck. Dinah clenched her fists and held back. She still wanted Robert to pay for his crimes, for Moira, but she wouldn't be party to his death. Tommy used her beliefs against her and sought to buy more time.

"I'm not the monster you think I am Dinah," Tommy started, and Dinah blanched at the knowledge he knew her identity too; "The Glades took my parents from me, no one that lives there is innocent. All I'm trying to do is see to it that no other child goes through the pain I did."

"You want to convince me you're not a monster, then tell me how to stop the bombs, help me save the children of the Glades who have done nothing criminal but be born in the wrong part of town."

"Don't try to reason with him Dinah. Scream, kill us both while there's still time. Punish him for his crimes, make him pay for Oliver," Robert cried out, then choked off when Tommy pressed his blade deeper into Robert's neck. A thin line of blood welled along the blade's edge.

"Enough Robert," Dinah snapped, taking a half step forward in her anger. He had no right to use the love of her life against her.

"Yes, enough of your lies Robert. Time to tell Dinah the truth about how Oliver died," Tommy eased back the blade and gave the Hood a firm shake. Dinah focused on Robert despite her intentions not to waiver on Merlyn. Her father-in-law refused to meet her eyes; "I'll admit, I arranged to have a bomb placed on the _Queen's Gambit_. I knew Robert was getting cold feet about our Undertaking and decided to make an example of him to the others before anyone got any ideas about betraying me. I didn't know Oliver planned to join him on that trip until it was too late. I regretted his death, truly I did Dinah, but it wasn't my bomb or the ocean that took your husband from you. Was it, Robert?"

He killed her husband and had the gall to say he regretted it when he'd never even grieved for Oliver's death. Dinah felt a rage whirl through her that aimed at Tommy Merlyn. She looked to Robert for clarification about how Oliver had finally died, but he still refused to look up at her.

"Go on Robert, tell her what you told Moira before you killed her," Tommy taunted and at his statement, Robert blinked at him in surprise. Merlyn smiled coldly at his captive; "Oh yes, I heard everything you admitted to your wife. She knew you'd come for her and kept a recorder on her knowing she'd bring you down with her death. A pity I didn't find it until earlier tonight. It doesn't matter now. Confess Robert, or die."

"Merlyn," Dinah stalked forward. Not certain if she intended to stop Tommy or scream until his ears bled. She hadn't decided before Robert realized Tommy's threat was serious.

"I killed him, I killed Oliver. He made it onto the life raft with me and another member of the crew. There wasn't enough food and water for the three of us. I knew a sacrifice had to be made. I was going to pick Oliver, to ask him to right my wrongs, but all he could think of was getting back to you Dinah and your kids. I realized he didn't have the strength to survive, to become what was needed to stop Merlyn. So, I shot him. I shot him in the head and buried him on Lian Yu."

Rage and horror and grief boiled up inside Dinah. She screamed. The Hood and Merlyn tried to dodge, but both were tossed across the roof. They landed on opposite sides, clutching their heads as they groaned. Dinah had to pick which one to attack first. She never got the chance. The bombs denoted first.

Flames erupted. Buildings trembled. Sirens screamed. People cried and yelled. In all the chaos, Dinah heard Ted frantically calling for Roy over the comms. Her heart clenched. Vengeance would have to wait. Her son came first.

She'd turned her mic off when she headed after Robert and Tommy but kept the earpiece on. She'd needed to hear how Roy and Ted and the police were doing in the evacuation. She'd barely registered their last locations during Robert's confession. Now the details flooded back to her and she ran. She opened her channel, demanding Ted tell her what had happened, begging Roy to answer her. Ted told her to deal with Merlyn, he would find Roy. Dinah ignored him. Roy said nothing. Dinah ran harder. Civilians reached out for her, cried out for help, but she couldn't stop. Her son needed her more.

She found Roy's last location. An apartment building now up in flames. A dozen families milled about the street in shock. A little girl sobbed in her mother's shoulder and her mother looked to Dinah with such sorrow in her dark eyes. Dinah asked them where Speedy was, a young man in a yellow hoodie. Tears welling, the sorrowful mother pointed towards the burning building. _No_. No. NO!

Dinah charged towards the entrance. The heat dried the sweat on her uniform and the tears on her cheeks. Not even to the door and the inky smoke had her coughing. Dinah paid no heed. She cried out Roy's name. Two wiry arms yanked her back before she could get inside. A terrible game of tug-of-war ensued. Dinah pushed forward with all her strength, needing to get to her son. The arms wrapped around her chest pulled her away from her boy. She scratched and kicked, but inch by inch she was hauled back from the blazing structure and into an empty alleyway. The cackle of the flames filled her ears. How was she supposed to hear Roy over them?

"Stop D, stop," Ted gasped hoarsely, wrangling her around to grab her face. Tears mixed with the soot that covered his face, his mask nowhere to be see; "He's gone Dinah. Roy's gone."

"No, no, no," Dinah shook her head fiercely. Not her oldest, survivor of the Glades with a chip on his shoulder and a heart too big and caring who wanted to save the whole world like his father. He couldn't, he wasn't –

Except he was.

* * *

Dinah wept.

* * *

 **A/N** _:_ The part about how Oliver really died, that was inspired by Andrus Tolero but has become head-cannon for me - and if _Arrow_ ever tells a different story, I just won't care. Construct feedback appreciated.


	8. Blaze

Disclaimer: See previous chapter.

* * *

Blaze

Dinah had thought she knew pain. Broken bones, torn muscles, and even a bullet to the thigh. A dead husband, sister, and parents. Then she lost a son. She failed her Roy. Then she knew.

She buried another empty casket next to Oliver's tombstone. There was nothing left to find once the fire finished, only rubble and char. She wanted to hold out on hope. That somehow her spirited, stubborn, roof-jumping son had survived. But the eye witnesses all agreed. Speedy had hustled a family with six young children out onto the street, carrying the youngest girl. Terrified, the little girl had started crying when she realized she'd dropped her favorite toy on the way down. Speedy had told her to cheer up, he'd rescue her friend. He'd just disappeared into the hallway when the bomb had exploded, sending the whole building up in flames. He never made it back outside.

They told the public Roy died trying to help friends evacuate the Glades. A lot of good people died that night, so the living didn't connect Roy Harper with Speedy, the vigilante the city honored with a plaque for his heroism.

Dinah Queen just wanted her son back.

She clutched Connor to her as they laid the casket to rest in the uncaring earth. She trembled, tears falling like raindrops. _Roy_.

A few nights later she tucked Connor into bed, softly humming his nighttime song though her heart wasn't in it. She ran a hand through his red mane, his blue eyes watching her sleepily, so trusting yet sad.

"Roy's with Daddy and Nana now?" he asked innocently. Dinah held back the sob that threatened to choke her and nodded carefully. Connor reached up to gently pat her cheek; "Don't be sad Mommy, they're angels now in heaven."

"You're right sweetie," she pressed a kiss to his forehead and tucked his favorite stuffed animal, Roy's old toy friend, next to him. Then she crept out of his room. Ted found her sobbing into her pillow and shaking an hour later.

The city pulled together following the horror in the Glades. Tommy Merlyn fled before he was outed as the culprit behind the destruction. A federal manhunt began. Any evidence he had against Robert went with him, so Robert Queen and the Hood remained free. Dinah blamed them both, for Oliver, for Moira, and Roy. She blamed herself for Roy as well. She was his mother, it was her job to protect him, and instead she let him run headlong into danger and he died.

The Black Siren disappeared for several months. She needed to focus on Connor, to give herself time to grieve, and the city didn't need her quite as much with the Hood still running around. When the Hood copycats showed up and Robert did nothing to stop them, unwilling to take on a group that outnumbered him and were expecting him, John Diggle tracked Dinah down. She helped him take out the copycats and leave them for the police to clean up, but then made it clear to him that so long as he worked for Robert she wanted nothing to do with him. The Black Siren returned to protecting her city, Ted pulling double-duty as babysitter and eye-in-the-sky. If the Siren was rougher on the criminals she took down than before, she was just speaking the language they understood, a lesson she'd learned the hard way.

BS-BC-BS-BC

The first time she killed a man, it was an accident. She'd closed her flower shop late, after a busy day delivering bouquets and large arrangements to two different weddings on top of her usual business. A man from the Glades attacked her on her way to her car. He stuck a knife to her back and demanded all her money. Dinah felt annoyed with herself for getting so rusty that she hadn't caught sight of the man before he snuck up on her – she hadn't resumed her nightly activities at that point. Unfortunately, Dinah couldn't risk exposing her true skill, and handed over her wallet. The man found the hundred or so dollars she had on her and then demanded more, believing she had cash from her business with her. She told him she didn't have any on her that night, but he wouldn't believe her. He came at her with the knife and she defended herself. She blocked his swing, grabbed his arm, and wrenched it until he dropped the knife. Then she twisted his arm behind his back and shoved him down the street, away from her and his weapon. He stumbled at her push, then fell. His head cracked on the curb and there was so much blood. When he stayed down, his eyes looking glassily up at the skyline, Dinah panicked. She called for emergency services, but by the time they arrived he was long dead. The police arrived, there were questions and a statement to be signed. They ruled it self-defense, a justifiable homicide.

At first, her hands would shake when she thought about what she'd done. His face flashed constantly in her dreams, so accusing. She almost backed out of her intentions to become Black Siren again, but then she learned the man she'd killed had a rap sheet as long as her arm that included theft, assault and battery, and suspected murder. She realized she'd done the city a favor, taking one crook off the streets for good. She knew that was a dangerous path to start thinking, but the thoughts continued to crop up as Black Siren hit the streets. She didn't share her thoughts with Ted, not until after the second and third bodies dropped. She was out in a fight as Black Siren, going up against a new gang in the city trying to make a name for themselves with store robberies and nightclub hold-ups. She stumbled into a group of eight of them terrorizing a family in their car. Eight on one might've been fair, if not for the guns two of them carried. She had only a moment's warning as the first gun was cocked; she reacted, the only thought in her head that she couldn't leave Connor an orphan. She used the punk she'd just engaged in hand-to-hand as a shield, let him take three bullets meant for her. Then she flung him aside and grappled with the shooter for the weapon. Another boy yanked out his gun, yelling that he'd shoot. She twisted the gun away from the first and pulled the trigger.

"What were you thinking Dinah! That's not the way we do things!" Ted yelled at her later. The TV on mute in the background, the reporter covering the sudden change in Black Siren's MO looked shocked at the words coming out of her mouth. Dinah and Ted were in her apartment, the new one she'd found, unable to stay where Roy had once lived. Connor slept just down the hall, but they were both too amped up to care.

"Maybe it's the way we should. If I had been willing to kill the Hood when he first showed up, then Moira might still be alive. If I had killed Merlyn, Roy would still be here!" Dinah blinked back her tears.

"That doesn't make it right! We aren't the jury and executioner, you know that."

"They were already felons, convicted by their peers, and what good did their time in jail do? They were back at their old crimes when I found them. Now they won't harm another family."

Ted wouldn't see reason. She didn't head out seeking to kill, she just stopped wasting precious energy trying to take down criminals when a simple scream worked better. She drew a line, she only killed those she knew were criminals and only when it was the most efficient answer to the problem they presented. It was a more effective form of justice, because when she put a man down, he stayed down, and the other criminals learned to fear her more than they feared the Hood. Ted refused to help her out as the Black Siren, not in investigations or even to watch Connor when she went out. He stopped trying to convince her to refrain from killing but told her that she needed to stop before she became the creatures she hunted.

It was uncomfortable at first, going out alone without someone to back her up, even if that was only as a voice in her ear. She missed the banter she used to share with Ted and Roy, the advice her adoptive uncle liked to dole out during stake outs, and even the grumbling when she dove head first into explosive situations without letting him get eyes on the layout. She held to her convictions however and he had his. Then she found a new friend in the form of John Diggle. He'd grown tired of Robert's vendetta against the rich and powerful; John wanted to help the average citizens more, not continue to focus on the list. He also didn't approve of Robert's kill-first policy.

"I kill too you know," Dinah reminded him.

"You kill when you think you have to, there is a difference. I'm not saying I agree with all your actions, but I understand the costs of war, the little pieces that get chipped away over time. I want to help you remember the reasons you fight, the reasons you stay human. You do good work in Starling City, Dinah, but you could do better, and I'd like to help you do that again."

She let Diggle in and Robert stayed away. He'd been avoiding her since the Undertaking. When he learned she'd begun to kill, he did his best to stay out of sight. Dinah was almost disappointed, because she knew the next time she saw her husband's killer, she was going to get justice for Oliver.

Then Harrison Wells' particle accelerator exploded.


	9. Inferno

Disclaimer: The usual ones apply.

 **A/N** : Watched Siren-X on the Flash, her powers were cool, the rest of the character was forgettable, because she didn't have any character. Was not impressed. My take away (in Stephen Amell's Hood voice): ARROWVERSE WRITERS, YOU HAVE FAILED DINAH LAUREL LANCE! If you disagree, that's your opinion, this is mine. Constructive feedback on my writing is appreciated. Thanks.

* * *

Inferno

The world knew Black Siren had a gift. She'd stopped hiding her scream less than a year into her night career. At first the people had believed she used some prototype gadget to knock criminals off their feet and hurt their ears. They soon figured out the truth. The media had dubbed it her Sonic Song, once they learned her name was Black Siren, then eventually, it simply became her Song. Theories whizzed about how she'd gotten her gift and once she'd even been accosted by a chirpy blonde in glasses who wanted the inside scoop and risked a mugging to get it. Dinah had no answers for them, any more than she did for herself.

Then Harrison Wells turned on his particle accelerator and the machine exploded, sending dark matter underground and into areas where less pleasant people lived in Central City. People started to change after that, develop unnatural abilities similar to Black Siren's gift. They gave people like Dinah a new name, metahumans, and things quickly went downhill from there. Most citizens in Starling City liked Black Siren; there were naysayers who hated her tendency to kill, but most respected the justice she brought to her city and the lives she saved. Then Zoom rose out of the ashes of Wells' explosion. He was psychopath who killed for fun and terrorized Central City; he drew to him other metahumans with similar inclinations and whatever goodwill Black Siren had inspired was forgotten. People rallied for protection and they were willing to do anything to get it, including declaring metahumans not human and therefore not protected under the Constitution or the conventions of the United Nations. Dinah took precautions when she went out as Black Siren, Starling City hadn't turned on her yet, but she knew sentiment could flip over night.

Four months after the explosion, barely a month after Zoom's terror strikes began, Felicity contacted John and Dinah. She claimed Robert had struck a deal with Brother Blood, a sadistic man plaguing the Glades whom Dinah and John believed responsible for an ever-growing list of missing people. Felicity also said that Robert had started talking about hurting the innocent family members and friends of criminals who evaded his bow. She sounded scared, and desperate to escape Robert, yet apologetic to be bothering them with her problems. Dinah was forcibly reminded of Moira in her last few weeks. John had reservations, but Dinah agreed to meet Felicity on neutral ground and see what could be done to spirit the bespectacled blonde away. Behind her back, John talked Ted into manning the coms that night so that Diggle could join Dinah in the field. She didn't understand his distrust of his former teammate, but John said his gut told him something was wrong. Dinah trusted John's instincts, accepting that she was emotionally compromised when it came to Robert, and they planned the meeting very carefully. The more cynical part of her was expecting the Hood to show up and try and kill her. He knew he had to take Dinah down before she had the chance to kill him, and Dinah wouldn't have put it beneath him to use Felicity as his ignorant bait. The truth was far worse.

"Felicity, you're early," Dinah commented as she walked up to the shorefront. The other blonde jumped and whipped around at the sound of her voice. Dinah stopped a few steps away from Felicity and waited for the other woman to make the first move.

They'd agreed to meet at the shoreline, in a section that offered few nests to a sniper, or an experienced archer. Diggle had already cleared the few positions Robert might have used if this was an attempt on Dinah's life. Now Diggle waited in their evac position, listening in to every word as intently as Ted was back at their base. Nervously, Felicity took a couple steps closer to Dinah, glancing over the open water to their right.

"I have evidence, that I'm willing to turn over to police, but I want your protection," Felicity rushed out, inching a couple steps closer; "Please say you'll help me."

Felicity paced closer, almost with arms reach, and looked back out at the water. Seeing her in person, the fear of Robert seemed more forced, though fear certainly laced Felicity's every movement. Dinah took a cautious step back and asked:

"Did Robert put you up to this?"

Felicity's answer was a sharp inhale, then she lunged forward, a syringe in her hand. She aimed for Dinah's neck, but she'd given herself away too soon. Dinah stepped out of range, grabbed the other woman's wrist, and quickly disarmed her. She stomped on the syringe with her combat boot for good measure. Felicity backed away from Dinah as if expecting to be screamed at until her ears bled. "Why?" was all Dinah wanted to know. Instead of answering, Felicity turned and fled. A second later, a dozen dark bodies with automatic rifles rose out of the water. Dinah backed up, waiting until they took aim at her to be certain, then she screamed. The men went flying back in the water and Dinah sprinted towards the evac point. Ted and John were both yelling in her ear to get out of there.

Robert caught her under the pier, midway to the evac position. She took an arrow to the thigh before she located his roost and screamed. He dropped to the ground disoriented and even with her injured leg she quickly outmaneuvered him and forced him face first into the ground. She wanted to scream until his eyes bled, but she needed answers first.

"ARGUS wants you alive and this clears me of my debt to them," Robert snarled at her. Ted warned her of approaching bodies, with her injury there wasn't time to get her vengeance and escape. Connor came first, so Robert lived another day.

She reached Diggle just as a second team of heavily-armed men spread out to try and capture her. She screamed again. That forced them to take cover. She slipped into the car and Dig gunned it. They escaped but had only more questions.

Dinah knew a little bit about ARGUS, mostly through Ted and her mother who'd had some run-ins with the organization back in the day. She knew they weren't the kind of governmental agency she wanted to get tangled up in and certainly not the type she'd want coming after her. Even John knew about ARGUS and while Ted fixed Dinah's leg, he checked in with an old friend who had a connection to the organization. Minutes after Ted finished the bandage, John barged back into the base.

"Ted, get back to Dinah's. Pack her and Connor a go-back, necessities only. Then grab Connor and bring him to this location asap," John shoved a piece of paper in Ted's hand and the older man left, hearing the urgency in Dig's tone; "Dinah, we need to move. I've got a friend in the city we need to visit, he should be able to help us get you out of here tonight. Here wear this."

"Diggle, what's going on?" she asked as she slipped on the red wig she'd kept for the occasional daytime surveillance.

"You've been compromised," he answered, and fear shot through her at those words. Her main concern wasn't for her own safety, but Connor's. She trusted John and Ted though and stayed with Diggle even as her instincts screamed at her to find her little boy.

It turned out, John's contact with ARGUS was his ex-wife and she warned Diggle to run because her agency had him in the crosshairs as an associate of Black Siren. ARGUS knew Dinah Queen was the Black Siren and they wanted to capture her to study her, to find a solution to the metahuman problem. They also wanted Connor, in case he'd inherited his mother's metahuman DNA, and the idea of experimenting on a mother and child didn't sit right with Lyla Michaels. Her early warning allowed them enough time to escape Starling City, but then they all had to go into hiding – Dinah and Connor, Diggle, and Ted.

"I can't believe Robert would be okay with this, his own grandson," Ted murmured that first night in the cheap motel room they were crashing in. Connor lay sleeping in one of the queen beds while the three adults made plans.

"His killed his own son, I don't there's much he's not capable of these days," Dinah snarled. Now that they were out of direct harm, her fear had melted away to anger. This was not the life she wanted for her remaining child.

They split up to make tracking them harder. Dinah and Connor headed to Central City, because were better to hide a meta than in a city full of them. Diggle headed to Coast City as he had family in the region who needed to be warned. Ted said he was going to check out Hub City, but Dinah knew he'd stay close to her and Connor. He was protective that way.

Her baby wasn't even seven-years-old, and Dinah had to instill in him the idea that there were bad people in the world who would hurt him if he didn't pretend to be someone else. She taught him to lie and keep secrets. She failed him. She couldn't even promise him a better future, because she couldn't see a better one for metas so long as Zoom lived. She entertained the idea of trying to kill Zoom as Black Siren. With the head gone, the rest of his posse would be easier to dismantle. That might help the regular people fear metahumans less or make them fear her most of all. Either way, Dinah hadn't a clue how to take down a man faster than sound and couldn't take the risk to Connor.

They lived under the names Dee and Carter Harper. They switched apartments every couple of months and mostly kept to themselves. She made certain to keep Connor in the same school, to give him a chance at some normalcy. Dinah worked two part-time jobs and kept no set schedule outside of getting Connor to school on time and picking him up. Connor tentatively started to make a few friends and Dinah quietly conducted background checks on them and their families. She didn't bother trying to make friends herself. She didn't have it in her to trust anyone beyond John and Ted. Mia Dearden became to only exception to that rule.

They met at the coffee shop were Dinah worked night shifts and early mornings. Mia frequented the location in between community college classes and studying. They started talking about trivial matters during lulls in traffic and when Mia needed a break from her school work. There was something about the younger woman that reminded Dinah a lot of Moira and sometimes, even Oliver. She developed an affinity for Mia. Soon enough they were discussing Mia's troubles selecting a major and Dee's frustrations with her second job. Eventually, Mia mention an opening at the store where she worked to pay for college. The job offered more flexible hours and better pay. Dinah applied and landed the position of managing self-absorbed teenagers, college know-it-alls, and Mia. Then Dinah rescued Mia.

It happened late on a weekday night. Dinah and Mia closed the store together. There was supposed to be a third body with them, but that teenager hadn't bothered to show up for his shift. Dinah had some last-minute duties to attend to before she could leave, but she didn't want Mia walking to her car alone. Mia insisted she'd be fine, and not wanting to detain her friend, Dinah relented. A protective instinct had her rushing through those final steps and then heading out the back door. In the shadows of the employee parking lot she found two men assaulting Mia. The bigger man held Mia from behind, pinning her arms to her sides and holding her jaw shut. The second man was pulling Mia's pants down. Dinah attacked.

She yanked the smaller man back in a chokehold before delivering two hard jabs to his kidneys. She shoved him to his knees, kicked him in the balls for good measure, and then cracked his head against the nearby garbage container. The larger man dropped Mia and took a swing at Dinah. She dodged his force-driven punch and swept his feet out from under him. When he rolled to his feet, she knocked him out with a well-placed punch of appropriate strength. A shocked, almost hysterical Mia fell into her arms.

"What do we do now?" Mia asked once she dried her tears. The men were still out cold. Dinah was between a rock and a hard place. She decided to trust Mia with part of the truth.

"You need to call the cops. To report them so that they can't try this with another woman, but I can't be involved Mia."

"Why not?"

"My son and I are in hiding, because of something we cannot control, something that makes us different. We don't want to cause trouble, we just want to live our lives like anyone else, but others would hurt us if they find us."

"You mean, your metas?" Mia was a smart girl. And the idea that Dinah wasn't a regular human didn't seem to freak her out. Dinah hoped her instincts about the younger woman were right.

"Yes."

"Go," Mia squared her shoulders, no more fear in her eyes; "I'll tell the police I came back because I thought I'd forgot something in the store, only you were already gone. They attacked me, but a woman in black saved me."

"Thank you, Mia."

"No, thank you."

From then on, Dinah had a friend in Mia Dearden. Someone she could trust to watch Connor, someone she could confide in face-to-face. Mia proved to be an excellent babysitter and supportive confidante. Life brightened a little for Dinah. Then, the other shoe dropped.

Living in a city under siege from Zoom, news from the outside world trickled in at a crawl. At first, all she heard was rumors of Black Siren's return to Starling City and she dismissed the talk as foolish hope. Then a Starling City councilmember died, a decent politician from the sounds of things who'd supported an award to recognize Black Siren before she began killing. He was killed with a sonic blast. Then more bodies began to drop, a growing number of good people with no criminal records or illicit connections. Black Siren was blamed, and Dinah's stomach churned at the thought of a copy cat destroying her legacy.

"It isn't me," she told Ted once the story broke. A part of her truly feared he'd think her capable of the murders.

"I never thought that kiddo, not for a second," he assured her, and Dinah breathed a sigh of relief. He still saw the good in her.

"What are we going to do about this meta?"

"We do nothing. You stay with my grandson and keep him safe. I'll deal with the imposter."

Dinah hated that his plan involved him going alone. Ted had been out of the fight for years and metahumans were more resilient than the hoodlums of the Glades he used to beat up. Ted maintained that he'd be fine, that he had a solid plan. Dinah knew she couldn't stop him and anxiously let him go. A week after Ted returned to Starling City to smoke out the fake Black Siren, Dinah received a call from his burner phone.

"Ted?"

"I'm afraid Ted can't come to the phone right now," a woman's taunting voice replied; "If you want him back alive Black Siren, come get me yourself. I'll text you the address. You have until midnight or Wildcat dies."

Fear choked her. She knew Ted wouldn't want her risking hers and Connor's safety to rescue him. But she couldn't lose another loved one. She made two calls.

Winter break had started for college students and Mia was happy to watch Connor for a weekend. She accepted Dinah's explanation of an old friend in need with very few questions and a wish for good luck. The second call Dinah placed was to John. She gave him a concise summary of the situation and her plan. He met her at the train depot in Starling City.

Dinah dressed for the occasion in her old gear while Diggle scouted out the location. He returned to confirm the worst. As they'd suspected, ARGUS had the building surrounded and expected her to walk right into their trap. Too bad for them, Dinah knew Starling City like the back of her hand. She used the underground tunnels to gain access to the building unseen. Diggle jammed the ARGUS com system and set about disabling the agents at various exits. Dinah cleared each room on the first floor without alerting the ARGUS agents to her presence. She heard a couple of them when they discovered their radios were down and began an active patrol, but she ghosted around them. Brushing plastic tarps out of her way, she found Ted shackled to a chair on the second floor. He lay limp against the chair, legs sprawled at uncomfortable angles. His mask had been flung onto the floor next to him. A large gash marred his graying buzz cut; the wound no longer oozed. His fingers had all been broken; red slashes marked his arms and unmoving chest. His left eye was swollen shut, but his right one stared unseeingly ahead. Defiant until the end.

His skin was rapidly cooling beneath her fingertips. Blood had trickled from his good eye and ears – a sonic scream had felled the mighty Wildcat, and recently. It wasn't midnight yet – that had been the deal. Her imposter hadn't cared. How close? If she'd arrived twenty minutes, a half hour, earlier. Would he still be breathing? Dinah knelt beside her uncle, a single tear trailed down her cheek as she gently grasped his wrist. Ted had deserved better.

A gun cocked behind her.

"And to think they still call you a hero. What would they say if they saw now? A weak woman sobbing over one man, a vigilante even more pathetic than you. At least he didn't cry," her imposter mocked, each word fanning the wrath in Dinah's veins. Dinah channeled that rage, honing in on the fake's position behind her without needing to look while slipping a hand down to her boot. That was the other woman's second mistake, never let your opponent hide their hands from your sight. Her third mistake was to keep on talking. "Waller wants you alive. Believes you have greater potential than me," the fill-in scoffed; "Why don't we test that theory. Stand up Siren, let's sing and see whose song is better. I said, stand up, and face me."

Dinah had unsheathed her boot dagger. Then she made as if to rise but shifted into a roll at the last second. The imposter pulled the trigger. A bullet whizzed over Dinah's head as her talon flew true. A soft thud, the brunette stumbled backward. Her gun clattered to the ground. She fell to her knees, blood seeping around the blade buried deep in her chest. The imposter grasped the hilt, smart enough to recognize that if she pulled it out she'd only speed up her demise. Shock and pain filled her expression as Dinah stalked over to her. Dinah kicked the gun out of reach and stooped to her challenger's level.

"Do you know what your first mistake was sweetie?" she adopted a sugary tone underlined with ice; "You thought you could compare yourself to me."

Then Dinah sang. Brown tresses fanned around the bloated face that hit the floor. What had once been a head was nothing more than a skin-sack of pulverized bone, muscle, and blood when she finished. Dinah felt nothing as she looked over her work. No sense of accomplishment, no justice or vengeance. Her heart ached for Ted as she whistled, chains shattering, then she hefted him up fireman style and found the nearest exist John had created for them.

They buried him next to Oliver and Roy's empty caskets, just her and Diggle digging until their palms ached and sweat ran in rivulets down their backs. The Queen mansion stood a dark and silent witness behind them. The moon provided the light they needed for their somber task. Dinah tried to say a few words, but found her voice strangled – another loved one lost that she never took the time to tell how much he met to her. Diggle barely knew the man, yet his eulogy, simple but heartfelt, described the kind of man Ted had always been: compassionate, loyal, courageous, and protective; far from perfect, but a hero in every form. Dinah missed him so much already. She trembled and cried, soundlessly.

Dig insisted on seeing her safely back to Connor. They took the late afternoon train to Central City. Dusk was nearing as they strolled to the apartment she shared with her son, using counter-surveillance techniques as they went. John wanted her to take Connor out of the country, to a place a little less afraid of metahumans, like Atlantis. Dinah was tired of living in the shadows, but she wanted to let Connor finish out the school year at least. They discussed better ways for them to live off the grid until then and how John would get them out when the time came. They spotted the smoke three blocks away, a sinister haze against a vibrant orange-red sunset. Dinah's heart froze at the sight, then she ran.

Her floor was already engulfed in deep red flames. People gawked on the street while fire engines screamed, and firemen fought back with ineffective hoses. Dinah pushed her way through the onlookers until she found a soot-streaked neighbor. The man didn't recognize her at first, but the moment he realized who she was he looked everywhere but at her.

"The lady asked you a question man, speak up," John barked behind her. He laid a steadying hand on her shoulder; she was already shaking.

"I'm sorry, by the time I head them screaming, there was no way to the door – I couldn't, I'm sorry."

He continued to apologize, she could see his lips forming the words, but the sounds were lost to her. The whispering of the crowd, the hiss of the water, even John's consoling tones and the shouts of the firefighters – all of it muted. A ringing filled her ears, as if she'd been caught next to an explosion, only she heard Connor's full-belly laughter too. The world grayed around her, like watercolors swiftly washed out, except for the sunset and fire, so much like Connor's hair. Then, nothing.


	10. Ashes

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Arrow_. If I didn't I wouldn't have had to write this backstory here.

 **A/N** : I'm kind of hoping that Black Siren is just playing Quentin to get him to stay in her corner, because I do believe she cares a little bit about him. I'm also really hoping that she's also playing Diaz, letting him build his empire, destroy NTA and OTA, then just as he's basking in his victory, she kills him and takes over. That would be wickedly awesome. But not likely to happen. Depending on how the season ends and where my inspiration flows, I may follow up this story with how I was hoping this season would go with Black Siren's character.

* * *

Ashes

She returned to the world slowly. Smoke and sweat assaulted her nose. She tasted salt on her lips. A scratchy blanket wrapped around her, to fight off the chill of the dark evening. Streetlights and the giant overhead lights on the fire engines lit the block as the dying embers fizzled out. Service personnel moved purposely to and from, keeping order and saving lives. Except the ones that mattered. She heard John's voice nearby, convincing a paramedic and cop to let her stay a few more minutes. She felt numb to the world around her. And oh, so tired. She huddled under her blanket in the back of the ambulance, unable to look away from the scorched building.

She could not describe the abyss she floated in. Gone. He was gone. They were all gone. Snipped away and leaving her, alone. Bereft. Inconsolable. None of the words fit, none of them made sense. She'd failed them all and couldn't even find a way to voice how that felt. Because the words did not exist. Nothing could do justice for the pain that ripped through her once the numbness faded. Blinding hot pain stabbed her unexpectedly in the gut. Then it tore up her chest and through her throat, doubling-up her spine along the way to the back of her eyeballs. From her fingertips to her toes, excruciating pain. She couldn't breathe. She couldn't escape. The pain eclipsed everything. Her heart thudded loudly in her ears, pumping out more of the liquid fire each second. She choked. End it, she had to end it. Oh please, make it stop!

The decision to stand wasn't a conscious one, but once she had, she had to move. The blanket dropped from her shoulders. She felt it pool around her feet as she found a path through the buzzing bodies. The first step felt like a cinder block was holding her down, but she made it. Then she took another and another. She was leaving, going somewhere or nowhere, it didn't matter. A voice shouted behind her, but the words meant nothing. Another voice burbled in her ear, a pale face flashed with concern. She side-stepped and continued. Hands grabbed at her, she pushed them off. A stronger grip wrapped around her wrist. She twisted the owner in front of her and pulled until the wrist snapped. Hers or his, she couldn't say, but no one touched her after that. Pain hounded her the whole time.

Buildings passed in a blur. People too. At first, she had no idea where she was going, only that she had to find a way to stop the pain. Then a thought trickled in, a sign she recognized that had her taking a sudden left. A car squealed to a stop and a horn blared. She sped up, a plan forming. Then she found it, a much more ominous place under the cover of darkness. The ARGUS base in Central City, in the day it looked like one of a dozen office buildings along the metropolitan block. The lies those glass windows and concrete pillars told. She'd located the base earlier, in case they were discovered. She'd wanted an idea of the layout of the place she might have to break into or escape. Now she arrived with a new purpose. She stood in the street, the pain thrumming through her. She unleashed a scream and at last found a voice for her pain. She screamed and screamed until she wailed. The building toppled before her and so did the offices on either side and those in the row behind. She had never destroyed half a block before, had never tried. There were people still inside, those on the late-night shift. The pain dashed away any regret for those in the other buildings, the pain required the deaths of the agents. The agents that made it out trained their guns on her. They called at her to freeze, to get on her knees, to not scream. She turned on them, taunted them, waiting for one to shoot. A couple waivered, but their leader barked, and they retreated. Someone called for tasers, they wanted her alive. She attacked. Agents dropped like flies, but still they never shot to kill. They all died instead. But the pain didn't end.

She walked away. The pain drove her to find a new target, one that would ensure it ended. She returned to Starling City. She chose the drug dealers that had started the pain all those years ago. They weren't as strong a cartel as they once had been, she'd continued to dismantle their organization once she put on the mask. She'd kept an eye on them until the day she'd left the city, but her knowledge of their habits was still good. She found their main distribution warehouse, waited until enough of the underlings loitered outside but a few of the bigger players remained inside. Then she struck. The warehouse collapsed, anarchy reigned. She sauntered up, baiting them to fight. They had enough guns on them to do the deed. Instead they fled. Spineless thugs, all.

She found her way back to her old base. Contemplated her next move. The police seemed the best choice. The problem was what to do to incite them into action. She was researching targets, leaning towards a direct approach, attacking a station head on, when a box popped up on her screen. She clicked on the message. Robert Queen's voice echoed in the dark room. "Let's end this Dinah. Just you and me. Victor walks away, loser dies. Meet me at the old Queen factory, one hour."

Rage lanced through the agony for a moment. Her target shifted. He wanted a fight to the death, well he'd get one, but neither of them would be walking away. She stalked to the factory, single-minded in her focus. Just like at the wharf, he hid above. Her scream shook him loose, but not before he shot off a trick arrow. She expected, hoped, for an explosive arrow, so that even if his aim was off, the blast would end the pain. Instead she staggered back, a warm metallic device locked around her neck. Not tight enough to garrote her and it lit up with a blue glow. ARGUS agents popped up out of the shadows, weapons raised. She turned to the nearest group and screamed, but only a human shriek sounded. She grabbed at the device around her neck, what was it doing to her? The agents moved in with arrogance. She lashed out. More of them died at the kiss of her blades and hands, but more arrived and with tranquilizers. They overwhelmed her as Robert watched from the fringes. She shrieked until the drugs claimed her.

She woke in a concrete box. There was no better word for it. The ceiling and floor and three of the walls all concrete. No bed, no sink, not even a bucket. She'd been stripped and dressed in flimsy gray scrubs. The device still glowed around her neck. Robert stood outside the remaining wall which was made of glass. His pet blonde sneered from behind him. He pressed a button on his side.

"Welcome to ARGUS, Dinah. Amanda has a lot planned for you and while normally I loathe her methods, in this case I'm making an exception. A creature like you deserves this place." She snarled at him and rose to her feet. Stalked closer to the glass. He held his ground; "It disgusts me to think my son shared a bed with a thing so unnatural. That he loved you. But I think if he'd known the truth, he never would've fought for you the way he did. He would've kicked you to the side like the trash you are."

She pounded her fists against the glass and screamed. Robert and his pet took a step back. The glass started to crack. Then gas poured in and she was unconscious again. Robert never returned.

She cut it out. That bleeding mess that was her heart. All it ever brought her was pain and she so wanted the pain to end. She crushed it in her hand and scattered the ashes with the memories in the corners of that cell. But even excised from her body, the echoes of pain persisted.

Days or hours passed in that cell. It was hard to tell. Food came at irregular intervals, drugged. Bathroom breaks were infrequent and heavily armed. A couple of times she was dragged into a different box, one with a chair and one-way mirror, where she was questioned about her ability and how she got it. She said nothing. They roughed her up a bit but got the same result. She slept a lot and stared at the walls. She wondered what they were waiting for as the cells filled up around her. The others tried to talk to her, but she ignored them. Then one day she woke to see an unsmiling, cold woman assessing her from the other side of the glass. She acknowledged the woman with a glance, then studied the ceiling.

"My name is Amanda Waller, I'm the director of ARGUS. My scientists tell me you've been refusing to answer their questions. That simply will not do. If you do not start cooperating, things will get very uncomfortable for you, very soon."

"And if I tell you what you want to know, will you kill me when you're done?"

"If you survive until then, perhaps. If I cannot find a use for you afterwards. My scientists have questions you cannot answer, which only tests will satisfy, and they cannot guarantee you will survive them all. They say you will teach us so much Black Siren, but I'm afraid you will not enjoy the process much."

Waller was right. Under ARGUS's care, she learned a new type of pain that held the other agony at bay.

They put her under the knife first. She woke up in her cell the first time with a chuck of hair missing and several stitches on the back of her head. They never told her what they did, but she figured it out when they stuck her in the questioning room and showed her pictures from before, pictures they had no right to have or touch. The pain and rage welled up. Then she felt woozy, as if she'd taken a hard blow to the head. She saw white spots and blacked out. Rough hands slapped her awake and they showed her more pictures. The hurt shot through her again and she blacked out. The third time, she controlled her breathing and held the agony back, didn't let it overwhelm her, and she stayed awake. They weren't too happy with that and one of the guards knocked her out. The second time she woke with a sliver of metal protruding from the right side of her head, just above her neck. The guards wasted no time in showing her what that piece of casing did. They dumped her in her cell, held up the little black device, and pressed a button. Pain volleyed from the back on her head, down her spine, and into every nerve ending. She screamed, the collar making it a weakly human cry, and they laughed.

The testing started next. At first, they wanted to know the extent of her ability, the range of frequencies she could hit and how fine-tuned she could make her scream – they had guesses but wanted facts; they didn't ask about the level of destruction she could cause. A simple yes or no from her wasn't enough for the doctors, they wanted demonstrations and measured data for their projects. They stuck her in a training room, a larger cell the size of a small gymnasium where they could safely watch her from above. The collar deactivated once the guards sealed the door behind her and the doctors would give her instructions. If she tried to use her scream to escape, the shock piece was used to bring her to her knees and they wouldn't feed her for days in punishment, after the guards whipped her. If she refused to complete the test, the collar would be reactivated, and the guards would beat her until she cooperated, then they'd withhold water. She fought back whenever the guards came for her. She even managed to kill a couple of them with her own bare hands. Both times, the remaining guards used the shock piece until she was writhing on the floor, then they kicked her into unconsciousness, but they never killed her in return. And when she was a good test subject, they rewarded her with better food and longer breaks between experiments. She knew what they were trying to do, and she swore to herself she wouldn't break, but every time they dragged her bruised and bleeding back to her cell, she could feel her resolve crumble a little more.

Once the scientists were satisfied they understood the parameters of her ability, they decided to dig deeper into her genetic code. That meant more surgeries, where they no longer bothered to put her under; they gave her enough anesthetic to keep her from squirming and restrained her to the operating table. Then they took samples – blood, tissue, bone marrow, eggs, and parts of her liver and spleen. In between the surgeries they gave her injections and exposed her to different chemicals. Once they even tested her against elevated levels of radiation, after sterilizing her took a higher dose of radiation than expected. She became too weak to put up much of fight. Hallucinations became normal, but the hauntings were the worst. Her husband would find her in her cell, sneering; "What a pathetic creature you are. I never loved you. I never fought for you, because deep down I knew exactly what you were, a monster with a pretty smile." She screamed at him that wasn't true, that he wasn't her love, but he laughed mockingly at her and asked how she could be sure. Her older son watched over her in the lab, when they pressed an open flame to her thigh to see how badly she would scar from third degree burns – he smiled in apathy to her pain. Her baby crooned to her on the operating table and she felt tears build, but never cried.

She kept waiting to die. Thinking, this one will do it. This injection will be the lethal dose, the one that ends the pain and suffering. Only she kept healing, kept surviving, even when she tried not to. She heard the doctors whispering, her metagene included a strong healing factor, nothing like a speedster's but far more impressive than any of the other made-metas. They believed it was connected to the fact she was born a metahuman, but they couldn't test that theory without another natural meta. They took her eggs the next day; that was before they decided it was safer to sterilize her. She stopped eating and drinking. She thought she lasted a few days before the guards realized. They attempted to beat reason back into her first, but she was too weak to even moan. Then the doctors found out, they hooked her up to an IV and force fed her. Waller visited her once she was sent back to her cell and told her the next time she tried that gambit the punishment would be more severe and very uncomfortable. She tried again anyway; Waller remained true to her threat. She fed herself from there on. She let go of the hope for death, and eventually the wish to die receded into another boxed-away part of herself. When they found a compound that would inhibit her abilities, they didn't even have to restrain her to implant the device in her arm. Only a shell remained.

Then Waller decided to find out which of the metahumans in her care were the strongest and most brutal. The director of ARGUS created her own little gladiatorial arena, pitting meta against meta in a fight to the death. She was their prized meta, safe from the matches in the beginning until Waller had winnowed out the weakest and wanted to see the Black Siren in action. They forced her to get back in shape, she didn't resist. They locked her in the gymnasium with another meta and told her to kill, she didn't hesitate. She killed a man who could spark fire from his fingertips; her scream forced him to the ground, but her hands snapped his neck. She killed a woman who could set off explosions with a touch. She used the woman's own ability against her, forcing an about-to-blow test tube down the woman's throat. She killed others too but didn't keep track of their abilities – their faces however were burned to the inside of her eyelids.

"Mr. Sobel will not be as easy to kill as your previous competitors. He has a regenerative ability far superior to yours and heals almost as fast as a speedster. The doctors tell me his ability is directly connected to his nervous system," Waller commented conversationally as they waited outside the gym. Waller liked to have these little chats just before they sent her in to kill. Each time, Waller hinted how her opponent's ability worked, then watched how that information was used in the following fight. "He also has a personal vendetta against you, you see he was in love with the woman I sent to impersonate you. The woman you brutally murdered."

She didn't react to Waller's words, which neither irritated nor amused the director of ARGUS. Despite Waller's implications, she had no doubt that she'd survive this fight. Even if the other meta managed to beat her, as unlikely as that was, he would be shocked before he could finish her. She'd almost died when they pitted her against a telepathic gorilla; they'd had to kill the gorilla because he wouldn't stop after his shock collar activated. Though they wanted to see how meta abilities clashed in a fight and they wanted a fair result, they still needed her alive for their other experiments. She couldn't find it in herself to care. Sobel died after a brutal fight – she had more experience in fighting, but his regenerative ability gave him an edge. She had to sing her most powerful song directly into his ear until his entire brain turned to mush; hard for a nervous system to react with the main center down.

The guards started calling her Black Siren after that, mocking the name she'd once wore. Eventually the doctors picked up the habit too. And finally, she began to feel again. Her vigilante name had stood for something once, something good and just in a city riddled with crime and no hope. It had been a separate part of her identity, one she did not think they could touch the way they did her personal life. Each time they derisively called her Black Siren, a new spark of anger formed inside her. They were perverting a symbol of courage, just as they'd tainted and remolded her. A small part of her that wasn't entirely done fighting couldn't stand it. That part of her fanned the anger and hardened it into a shield that existed just beneath the shell they crafted out of her. She hid the hatred that sustained her, that reminded her she wasn't a puppet anyone could control. She trained that rage as she began to train herself in her cell, plotting her revenge. All she had was her fury; at the guards and doctors, Waller and ARGUS. She even loathed humanity, which had abandoned her and hated her for something she could not control. She harnessed that temper and made her plans. They thought they held the power, that they could take that name too from her, but they were wrong. She would make them fear the name that once brought hope.

Sometimes her anger would press too tightly against her heart and she'd collapse thanks to the neutralizer chip in her head. Between the neutralizer and shock piece, her plans to escape faced setbacks. Eventually she realized she would need to seek the help of the other metahumans, the few that remained alive and capable of fighting back, if she was going to bring the facility and all of ARGUS down. After months of ignoring those in neighboring cells, she hesitated at starting any conversation. She wasn't even certain she remembered how to speak, for so long she'd only been screaming. The words came, stilted after first, and offered to the woman whose cell lay directly across from hers. Pure white hair after her meta ability fully manifested, her name used to be Caitlin, but now the guards called her Frosty. As bitter as she was cold, Frost had good potential. She hadn't brought up her new plans to Frost, was building her way up to that, when a third party enacted a different kind of rescue.

Zoom.

The speedster she'd once contemplated killing saved her from ARGUS. He rescued the metahumans and offered those strong enough to follow him outside a new future, one where they would be the overseers of their oppressors, where they could get revenge on those that had hurt them. Her anger kindled at the sight of Zoom; he was as much to blame for her suffering as Waller, but her time in the cage had taught her patience and emptiness. She pushed her rage back, let it simmer out of range as she accepted Zoom's offer. Frost joined too, as did a pair of brothers, and a man whose whole body turned into fire. A meta who could stretch himself still had a touch of humanity in him, he refused, and Zoom killed him on the spot. She watched without feeling, her shield of wrath back in place.

"Aren't you Dinah Queen?" the burning man asked as they destroyed the facility; doctors and guards still breathing inside.

"Dinah Queen is dead," she answered coldly.

"Then who are you?" Zoom inquired in that unnatural voice of his.

"I am, Black Siren."

BS-BC-BS-BC

And the world burned.

* * *

THE END


End file.
